A simple docker container that runs PostGIS

Visit our page on the docker hub at: https://registry.hub.docker.com/u/kartoza/postgis/

There are a number of other docker postgis containers out there. This one differentiates itself by:

• provides ssl support out of the box
• connections are restricted to the docker subnet
• template_postgis database template is created for you
• a database 'gis' is created for you so you can use this container 'out of the box' when it runs with e.g. QGIS

We will work to add more security features to this container in the future with the aim of making a PostGIS image that is ready to be used in a production environment (though probably not for heavy load databases).

Note: We recommend using apt-cacher-ng to speed up package fetching - you should configure the host for it in the provided 71-apt-cacher-ng file.

There are various ways to get the image onto your system:

The preferred way (but using most bandwidth for the initial image) is to get our docker trusted build like this:

docker pull kartoza/postgis

To build the image yourself without apt-cacher (also consumes more bandwidth since deb packages need to be refetched each time you build) do:

docker build -t kartoza/postgis git://github.com/kartoza/docker-postgis

To build with apt-cache (and minimised download requirements) do you need to clone this repo locally first and modify the contents of 71-apt-cacher-ng to match your cacher host. Then build using a local url instead of directly from github.

git clone git://github.com/kartoza/docker-postgis

Now edit 71-apt-cacher-ng then do:

docker build -t kartoza/postgis .

To create a running container do:

sudo docker run --name "postgis" -p 25432:5432 -d -t kartoza/postgis

You can also use the following environment variables to pass a user name and password.

• -e USERNAME=
• -e PASS=

These will be used to create a new superuser with your preferred credentials. If these are not specified then the postgresql user is set to 'docker' with password 'docker'.

For convenience we have provided a bash script for running this container that lets you specify a volume mount point and a username / password for the new instance superuser. It takes these options:

OPTIONS:
   -h      Show this message
   -n      Container name
   -v      Volume to mount the Postgres cluster into
   -u      Postgres user name (defaults to 'docker')
   -p      Postgres password  (defaults to 'docker')

Example usage:

./run-postgis-docker.sh -v /tmp/foo/ -n postgis -u foo -p bar

Connect with psql (make sure you first install postgresql client tools on your host / client):

psql -h localhost -U docker -p 25432 -l

Note: Default postgresql user is 'docker' with password 'docker'.

You can then go on to use any normal postgresql commands against the container.

Under ubuntu 14.04 the postgresql client can be installed like this:

sudo apt-get install postgresql-client-9.3

Docker volumes can be used to persist your data.

mkdir -p ~/postgres_data
docker run -d -v $HOME/postgres_data:/var/lib/postgresql kartoza/postgis`

You need to ensure the postgres_data directory has sufficinet permissions for the docker process to read / write it.

Tim Sutton (tim@kartoza.com) May 2014