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For a while, I was confused

Fundamentally, Docker Compose is just an easier way to start Docker containers.

How easy are we talking about?

With only one command, you can start hundreds of containers.

Today, we are going to investigate Docker Compose.

If you know nothing about Docker or YAML, you might want to read these two articles first:

Why Docker Compose? In any full-stack application, there’s a frontend, a backend, and a database.

You create a separate container for each of them.

But starting them up is a bit tricky.

Each of them requires a different configuration to start.

For example, this is how you start the database:

And this is how you start the Python backend:

Imagine what would happen if you had hundreds of containers.

To make this easier, Docker Compose was created.

You control the startup of all containers in one file

Create a compose.yaml file.

Each container becomes a service.

services:
  redis:
  frontend:
  backend:

For example, here’s how to convert a Docker command to start up a Redis container into a Docker Compose file.

And if we convert all the commands:

Now you only have to run 1 command to start all the containers.

docker compose up

One last thing.

Docker Compose is mostly used in development because it simply isn’t good enough.

In production, you use something like Kubernetes to orchestrate different containers.

This week, we have a bonus section.

But before that…

Dictate prompts and tag files automatically

Stop typing reproductions and start vibing code. Wispr Flow captures your spoken debugging flow and turns it into structured bug reports, acceptance tests, and PR descriptions. Say a file name or variable out loud and Flow preserves it exactly, tags the correct file, and keeps inline code readable. Use voice to create Cursor and Warp prompts, call out a variable like user_id, and get copy you can paste straight into an issue or PR. The result is faster triage and fewer context gaps between engineers and QA. Learn how developers use voice-first workflows in our Vibe Coding article at wisprflow.ai. Try Wispr Flow for engineers.

Bonus

  • Examples on how to integrate Docker Compose with commonly used tech stacks.

  • This tool lets you download a specific folder from a GitHub repo without cloning the entire project.

  • Dev Containers make local development with Docker a breeze.

And that’s it for today, see you next week.

Fee from Anime Coders

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