Docker images – types. Slim vs slim-stretch vs stretch vs alpine

Per docker library docs (quote and links below), here’s a summary:

  • openjdk:<version>

The defacto image. Use it if unsure.

  • openjdk:<version>-buster, openjdk:<version>-stretch and openjdk:<version>-jessie

buster, jessie or stretch are the suite code names for releases of Debian and indicate which release the image is based on.

  • openjdk:<version>-alpine

Similarly, this image is based on the Alpine Linux, thus being a very small base image. It is recommended if you need an image size is as small as possible. The caveat is that it uses some unusual libs, but shouldn’t be a problem for most software. In doubt, check the official docs below.

  • openjdk:<version> (from 12 onwards), openjdk:<version>-oracle and openjdk:<version>-oraclelinux7

Starting with openjdk:12 the default image as well as the -oracle and -oraclelinux7 variants are based on the official Oracle Linux 7 image.
The OpenJDK binaries in the default image as well as the -oracle and -oraclelinux7 variants are built by Oracle and are sourced from the OpenJDK community.

  • openjdk:<version>-slim

This image only contains the minimal packages needed to run Java (and is missing many of the UI-related Java libraries, for instance). Unless you are working in an environment where only the openjdk image will be deployed and you have space constraints, the default image is recommended over this one.

  • openjdk:<version>-windowsservercore

This image is based on Windows Server Core (microsoft/windowsservercore).


Full docs (version shown below here, latest version here):

Image Variants

The openjdk images come in many flavors, each designed for a
specific use case.

openjdk:<version>

This is the defacto image. If you are unsure about what your needs
are, you probably want to use this one. It is designed to be used both
as a throw away container (mount your source code and start the
container to start your app), as well as the base to build other
images off of.

Some of these tags may have names like jessie or stretch in them.
These are the suite code names for releases of
Debian and indicate which
release the image is based on.

openjdk:<version>-alpine

This image is based on the popular Alpine Linux
project
, available in the alpine official
image
. Alpine Linux is much smaller
than most distribution base images (~5MB), and thus leads to much
slimmer images in general.

This variant is highly recommended when final image size being as
small as possible is desired. The main caveat to note is that it does
use musl libc instead of glibc and
friends
, so certain
software might run into issues depending on the depth of their libc
requirements. However, most software doesn’t have an issue with this,
so this variant is usually a very safe choice. See this Hacker News
comment thread
for
more discussion of the issues that might arise and some pro/con
comparisons of using Alpine-based images.

To minimize image size, it’s uncommon for additional related tools
(such as git or bash) to be included in Alpine-based images. Using
this image as a base, add the things you need in your own Dockerfile
(see the alpine image
description
for examples of how to
install packages if you are unfamiliar).

openjdk:<version>-windowsservercore

This image is based on Windows Server Core
(microsoft/windowsservercore)
.
As such, it only works in places which that image does, such as
Windows 10 Professional/Enterprise (Anniversary Edition) or Windows
Server 2016.

For information about how to get Docker running on Windows, please see
the relevant “Quick Start” guide provided by Microsoft:

openjdk:<version>-slim

This image installs the -headless package of OpenJDK and so is
missing many of the UI-related Java libraries and some common packages
contained in the default tag. It only contains the minimal packages
needed to run Java. Unless you are working in an environment where
only the openjdk image will be deployed and you have space constraints, we highly recommend using the default image of this
repository.

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