Run Couchbase Docker Container

This guide explains how to start a Couchbase Docker Container and connect to it using the Couchbase CLI.

What you’ll build

Couchbase is an open source NoSQL document database. Couchbase can be downloaded and started on a variety of platforms from http://www.couchbase.com/nosql-databases/downloads. This guide will explain how to start Couchbase as Docker container. Then it will use the Couchbase CLI to connect and query the Couchbase server.

What you’ll need

• Docker, that’s it!

Setup

Install Docker on your machine as explained at https://docker.com/getdocker.

Run Couchbase Docker Container

Introduction

Several Couchbase Docker images are available at Docker Hub. The common ones are listed below:

Image	Purpose
couchbase	Latest GA of Couchbase Enterprise Edition
couchbase:community	Latest GA of Couchbase Community Edition
couchbase/server	Latest Developer Preview, Beta or GA release of Coucbbase
couchase/server:sandbox	Latest sandbox GA of couchbase/server

All images, except couchbase/server:sandbox, require Couchbase to be configured before it can be used. The couchbase/server:sandbox image is pre-configured developer sandbox to get you started quickly.

Complete set of tags are listed at https://hub.docker.com/r/library/couchbase/tags/.

More details about couchbase/server image is at https://hub.docker.com/r/couchbase/server/.

Run Couchbase Container

Open a terminal, start Couchbase Couchbase Docker container using the command:

docker run -d --name db -p 8091-8093:8091-8093 -p 11210:11210 couchbase/server:sandbox

Warning

This command uses default ports for Couchbase. If you already have a Couchbase instance running on your machine then this command may fail. Make sure to stop the local instance of Couchbase first.

In this command:

1. -d runs the container in a detached/background mode.

2. --name db assigns a name to the container. This will be used later.

3. -p 8091-8093:8091-8093 forwards the ports 8091 through 8093 on localhost to be forwarded to similar ports in container. Purpose of each port is explained at http://developer.couchbase.com/documentation/server/current/install/install-ports.html.

4. -p 11210:11210 forwards port 11210 on localhost to the same port in the container.

If the Docker image does not exist, then it will be downloaded and the container started.

Logs of the container can be seen using the command docker logs db.

See the list of running containers using the command docker ps. It shows the output as:

CONTAINER ID        IMAGE                      COMMAND                  CREATED             STATUS              PORTS                                                                                                         NAMES
e6c1037fd5ad        couchbase/server:sandbox   "/entrypoint.sh /opt/"   5 minutes ago       Up 5 minutes        8094/tcp, 0.0.0.0:8091-8093->8091-8093/tcp, 11207/tcp, 11211/tcp, 0.0.0.0:11210->11210/tcp, 18091-18093/tcp   db

Connect using Couchbase CLI

Connect to this Couchbase container using the Couchbase CLI:

docker run -it --link db:db couchbase/server:sandbox cbq --engine http://db:8093

Note	You may have to wait for about 30 seconds for the Couchbase container to be started before this command can be issued. Otherwise CBQ will not be able to connect to the Query service of Couchbase.

In this command:

1. -it runs the container in an interactive way and allows TTY interaction. This is required for Couchbase CLI to be able to communicate with the container.

2. --link creates a symbolic link to the running container. This allows to use the symbolic name to be referred later in the command.

3. cbq --engine http://db:8093 is the Couchbase CLI that connects using the symbolic name created earlier. This overrides the default command for the container.

It shows the output:

 No input credentials. In order to connect to a server with authentication, please provide credentials.
 Connected to : http://db:8093/. Type Ctrl-D or \QUIT to exit.

 Path to history file for the shell : /root/.cbq_history
cbq>

Run a N1QL query to get one JSON document from travel-sample bucket:

cbq> select * from `travel-sample` limit 1;
{
    "requestID": "61ecee61-490a-470c-98e6-4adea3477bb8",
    "signature": {
        "*": "*"
    },
    "results": [
        {
            "travel-sample": {
                "callsign": "MILE-AIR",
                "country": "United States",
                "iata": "Q5",
                "icao": "MLA",
                "id": 10,
                "name": "40-Mile Air",
                "type": "airline"
            }
        }
    ],
    "status": "success",
    "metrics": {
        "elapsedTime": "15.986262ms",
        "executionTime": "15.912342ms",
        "resultCount": 1,
        "resultSize": 300
    }
}

Type Ctrl+D to quit the \QUIT to exit the CBQ shell.

Stop and Remove Couchbase Container

Stop the container using the command docker stop db.

Remove the container using the command docker rm db.

Summary

Congratulations!

You started a Couchbase Docker container and connected to it using the Couchbase CLI and ran a query.