CoreOS released Rocket, a new portable container format, as an alternative to the Docker runtime. The idea is to provide a “standard container” that can be used for moving workloads between multiple servers and environments.
CoreOS is a San Francisco start-up building a new Linux distribution for modern infrastructure stacks. It consumes 40% less RAM on boot than an average Linux installation and features an active/passive dual-partition scheme to update the OS as a single unit instead of package by package. Applications on CoreOS can run as Docker containers.
Until now, CoreOS has been a big supporter of Docker. In a blog posting, the company said the Docker company has strayed from its early principle of building a simple, composable container unit that could be used in a variety of systems and supported by everyone. So CoreOS is now developing Rocket around the App Container specification and promoting it as a new set of simple and open specifications for a portable container format.
