>I run Docker and Podman on my Macs.

The same way Windows users run them. In a linux VM.

You don't get real on-hardware containerization.

Ah, I see what you’re saying. Basically, Darwin doesn’t support cgroups, so Docker runs Linux in a VM to get that.

I don't think it supports userland namespaces either, which is another important part of container isolation.

It has partial namespaces support for the iOS simulator.

surprisingly, Windows containers on Windows are not run in a VM. Well, not necessarily; they can be.

It is definitely odd that Macs have no native container support, though, especially when you learn that Windows does.

Well, Windows (in a form) is the hypervisor for the Azure infrastructure. Azure Web Sites when run as Windows/IIS are Windows containers. Makes sense.

Honestly I don't know what XNU/Darwin is good for. It doesn't do anything especially well compared to *BSD, Linux, and NT.

Its async i/o APIs are best in class (i.e., compatible with BSD, and not Linux’s epoll tire fire).

Not disagreeing though.

Linux has io_uring. NT outclasses XNU by a long shot with IOCP, Registered I/O, and IO Ring (io_uring copy).

That is an important point, I didn't really think of it since I've never had a reason to use Windows containers.

that's ok, no one thinks of windows, and fewer people than that would ever use a windows container.

> 1. I run Docker and Podman on my Macs.

That's using a Linux VM. The idea people are asking about is native process isolation. Yes you'd have to rebuild Docker containers based on some sort of (small) macOS base layer and Homebrew/Macports, but hey. Being able to even run nodejs or php with its thousands of files natively would be a gamechanger in performance.

Also, it were possible to containerize macos, or even do an unintended vm installation, then it’d be possible for apple to automatically regression test their stuff.

Thanks for introducing me to `uv`. I've been looking for a tool that integrates pip and pyenv/virtualenv.