Report: Docker Not Yet Widely Used in the Cloud

Canonical, the lead commercial sponsor behind the open-source Ubuntu Linux operation system, has published its latest Ubuntu Server and Cloud Survey, showing the emerging trends in server and cloud deployments.

The survey received responses from 3,100 Ubuntu server and cloud users globally.

Looking at the current state of deployment models for cloud infrastructure, 35.5 percent of the study’s participants are using private cloud infrastructure, while 22.8 are using public. 20 percent said that were using a hybrid approach, while 21.7 reported they were not using cloud infrastructure at this time.

Looking deeper into the cloud, the study asked which public cloud providers respondents were using. 30.0 percent indicated that they used Google Cloud, while 21.2 percent indicated they were using Amazon EC2. Microsoft’s Azure is being used by 6.6 percent of respondents while Rackspace is being used by only 4.2 percent.

In terms of cloud adoption challenges, 34.5 percent of respondents identified security and data privacy as their top concern, while 26.1 percent cited cost. 22.4 percent stated complexity was the key challenge while 9.2 percent noted that interoperability between cloud platforms and providers is likely to be the biggest hurdle to cloud adoption in the next 12 months.

For those that have built a private cloud, the study found that the top choice, not surprisingly, was OpenStack. Ubuntu has been a key OpenStack supporter and platform since OpenStack started.

64.5 percent of respondents agreed with the statement that OpenStack is ready for mission-critical workloads. Not all of the study’s participants are using OpenStack though; 17.9 percent of respondents are also using VMware’s vCloud platform.

A closer look at the workloads being deployed to the cloud reveals there is a wide variety. Database is the most deployed at 52.1 percent, followed closely by dev/test at 41.5 percent. Big Data is another key workload for cloud deployments, according to 21.5 percent of respondents, while 17.5 percent are using cloud for CRM.

Docker Not in Wide Use … Yet

While Docker is a hot topic for many, the study found it is not yet widely in use for cloud deployments. Only 18.4 percent of the Ubuntu study’s participants said they have used Docker to deploy workloads to the cloud. Going a step further, only 34.0 percent said they had plans to use Docker.

For those that have used Docker, the deployment workloads somewhat mimicked the responses given for cloud workload deployments. 49.4 percent of respondents said they have had Database workloads deployed via Docker, while 44.4 percent have used Docker to deploy dev/test workloads.

Sean Michael Kerner is a senior editor at ServerWatch and InternetNews.com. Follow him on Twitter @TechJournalist.

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