Docker Desktop 4.34: MSI Installer GA, Upgraded Host Networking, and Powerful Enhancements for Boosted Productivity & Administration | Docker

Key GA features of the Docker Desktop 4.34 release include: 

Docker Desktop 4.34 introduces key features to enhance security, scalability, and productivity for all development team sizes, making deploying and managing environments more straightforward. With the general availability (GA) of the MSI installer for bulk deployment, managing installations across Windows environments becomes even simpler. Enhanced authentication features offer an improved administration experience while reinforcing security. Automatically reclaim valuable disk space with Docker Desktop’s new smart compaction feature, streamlining storage management for WSL2 users. Additionally, the integration with NVIDIA AI Workbench provides developers with a seamless connection between model training and local development. Explore how these innovations simplify your workflows and foster a culture of innovation and reliability in your development practices.

Deploy Docker Desktop in bulk with the MSI installer

We’re excited to announce that the MSI installer for Docker Desktop is now generally available to all our Docker Business customers. This powerful tool allows you to customize and deploy Docker Desktop across multiple users or machines in an enterprise environment, making it easier to manage Docker at scale. 

Features include:

• Interactive and silent installations: Choose between an interactive setup process or deploy silently across your organization without interrupting your users.
• Customizable installation paths: Tailor the installation location to fit your organization’s needs.
• Desktop shortcuts and automatic startup: Simplify access for users with automatic creation of desktop shortcuts and Docker Desktop starting automatically after installation.
• Set usage to specific Docker Hub organizations: Control which Docker Hub organizations your users are tied to during installation.

Docker administrators can download the MSI installer directly from the Docker Admin Console.

One of the standout features of this installer is the --allowed-org flag. This option enables the creation of a Windows registry key during installation, enforcing sign-in to a specified organization. By requiring sign-in, you ensure that your developers are using Docker Desktop with their corporate credentials, fully leveraging your Docker Business subscription. This also adds an extra layer of security, protecting your software supply chain.

Additionally, this feature paves the way for Docker to provide you with valuable usage insights across your organization and enable cloud-based control over application settings for every user in your organization in the future.

What’s next

We’re also working on releasing a PKG enterprise installer for macOS, config profiles for macOS, and supporting multiple organizations in all supported sign-in enforcement mechanisms. 

Refer to our docs to learn about MSI configuration and discover more about sign-in enforcement via Windows registry key.

Host networking support to Docker Desktop 

Previously, Docker Desktop lacked seamless host networking capability, complicating the integration between host and container network services. Developers had to take time to set up and enable communication between the host and containers. Docker Desktop now supports host networking capability directly into Docker Desktop. 

Host networking allows containers that are started with --net=host to use localhost to connect to TCP and UDP services on the host. It will automatically allow software on the host to use localhost to connect to TCP and UDP services in the container. This simplifies the setup for scenarios in which close integration between host and container network services is required. Additionally, we’re driving cross-platform consistency and simplifying configuration by reducing the need for additional steps, such as setting up port forwarding or bridge networks. 

While this has previously been available in the Docker Engine, we’re now extending this capability to Docker Desktop for Windows, macOS, and Linux. We’re dedicated to improving developer productivity, and this is another way we help developers spend less time configuring network settings and more time building and testing applications, accelerating development cycles. 

This new capability is available for all users logged into Docker Desktop. To enable this feature, navigate to Settings > Resources > Network. Learn more about this feature on Docker Docs. 

Automatic reclamation of disk space in Docker Desktop for WSL2 

Previously, when customers using Docker Desktop for WSL2 deleted Docker objects such as containers, images, or builds (for example via a docker system prune), the freed storage space was not automatically reclaimed on their host. Instead, they had to use external tools to “compact” the virtual disk/distribution backing Docker Desktop.

Starting with Docker 4.34, we are rolling out automatic reclamation of disk space. When you quit the app, Docker Desktop will automatically check whether there is storage space that can be returned to the host. It will then scan the virtual disk used for Docker storage, and compact it by returning all zeroed blocks to the operating system. Currently Docker Desktop will only start the scan when it estimates that at least 16GB of space can be returned. In the future, we plan to make this threshold adaptive and configurable by the user.

The feature is now enabled for all customers running the Mono distribution architecture for Docker Desktop on WSL2. This new architecture, which was rolled out starting with Docker Desktop 4.30 for all fresh installations of Docker Desktop, removed the need for a dedicated docker-desktop-data WSL2 distribution to store docker data. We will be rolling out the new architecture to all customers in the upcoming Docker Desktop releases.

Customers with installations still using the docker-desktop-data WSL2 distribution can compact storage manually via VHDX compaction tools, or change the WSL2 configuration to enable the experimental WSL2 feature for disk cleanup.

(Pro tip: Did you know you can use the Disk Usage extension to see how Docker Desktop is using your storage and use it to prune dangling objects with a single click?)

Authentication enhancements 

Previously, authenticating via the CLI required developers to either type their password into the command-line interface — which should generally be avoided by the security-minded — or manually create a personal access token (PAT) by navigating to their Docker account settings, generating the token, and then copying it into the CLI for authentication. This process was time-consuming and forced developers to switch contexts between the CLI and the web portal.

In this latest Docker Desktop release, we’re streamlining the CLI authentication flow. Now, users can authenticate through a seamless browser-based process, similar to the experience in CLIs like GitHub’s gh or Amazon’s AWS CLI. With this improved flow, typing docker login in the CLI will print a confirmation code and open your browser for authentication, automating PAT creation behind the scenes and eliminating the need for manual PAT provisioning. This enhancement saves time, reduces complexity, and delivers a smoother and more secure user experience. Additionally, when you authenticate using this workflow, you’ll be logged in across both Docker CLI and Docker Desktop. 

This new flow also supports developers in organizations that require single sign-on (SSO), ensuring a consistent and secure authentication process.

Enterprise-grade AI application development with Docker Desktop and NVIDIA AI Workbench  

AI development is a complex journey, often hindered by the challenge of connecting the dots between model training, local development, and deployment. Developers frequently encounter a fragmented and inconsistent development environment and toolchain, making it difficult to move seamlessly from training models in the cloud to running them locally. This fragmentation slows down innovation, introduces errors, and complicates the end-to-end development process.

To solve this, we’re proud to announce the integration of Docker Desktop with NVIDIA AI Workbench, a collaboration designed to streamline every stage of AI development. This solution brings together the power of Docker’s containerization with NVIDIA’s leading AI tools, providing a unified environment that bridges the gap between model training and local development.

With this integration, you can now train models in the cloud using NVIDIA’s robust toolkit and effortlessly transition to local development on Docker Desktop. This eliminates the friction of managing different environments and configurations, enabling a smoother, more efficient workflow from start to finish. 

To learn more about this collaboration and how Docker Business supports enterprise-grade AI application development, read our blog post. 

Multi-platform UX improvements and the containerd image store  

In February 2024, we announced the general availability of the containerd image store in Docker Desktop. Since then, we’ve been working on improving the output of our commands to make multi-platform images easier to view and manage. 

Now, we are happy to announce that the docker image list CLI command now supports an experimental --tree flag. This offers a completely new tree view of the image list, which is more suitable for describing multi-platform images.

If you’re looking for multi-platform support, you need to ensure that you have the containerd image store enabled in Docker Desktop (see General settings in Docker Desktop, select Use containerd for pulling and storing images). As of the Docker Desktop 4.34 release, fresh installs or factory resets of Docker Desktop will now default to using the containerd image store, meaning that you get multi-platform building capability out of the box. 

To learn more about the containerd image store, check out our containerd documentation. 

Wrapping up 

Docker Desktop 4.34 marks a significant milestone in our commitment to providing an industry-leading container development suite. With key features such as the MSI installer for bulk deployment, enhanced authentication mechanisms, and the integration with NVIDIA AI Workbench, Docker Desktop is transforming how teams manage deployments, protect their environments, and accelerate their development workflows. 

These advancements simplify your development processes and help drive a culture of innovation and reliability. Stay tuned for more exciting updates and enhancements as we continue to deliver solutions designed to empower your development teams and secure your operations at scale. 

Upgrade to Docker Desktop 4.34 today and experience the future of container development. 

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