Skip to main content

Docker - Running some GUI interfaces in the browser

· 3 min read
Christophe
Christophe
Markdown, WSL and Docker lover ~ PHP developer ~ Insatiable curious.

Docker - Running some GUI interfaces in the browser

In a future article, I'll be covering a subject I've just discovered: the possibility of running graphical interfaces in Docker and, therefore, having a Linux application running in Windows.

But first, let's take a look at a few graphical interfaces, such as Firefox or GIMP (image processing software), which can be run as if they were web applications.

Start Firefox in your browser​

Imagine you're a web developer and just want to check if your site can be displayed on a specific version of Firefox (without having to install the version, of course).

Copy/paste the command below in your console (coming from https://hub.docker.com/r/linuxserver/firefox):

docker run -d \
    --name=firefox \
    --security-opt seccomp=unconfined \
    -e PUID=1000 \
    -e PGID=1000 \
    -e TZ=Etc/UTC \
    -e FIREFOX_CLI=https://www.linuxserver.io/ \
    -p 3000:3000 \
    -p 3001:3001 \
    -v /path/to/config:/config \
    --shm-size="1gb" \
    --restart unless-stopped \
    lscr.io/linuxserver/firefox:latest

Then open your browser and surf to http://localhost:3000 to start Firefox. You can then surf to any amazing site:

Start Firefox inside Docker in Chrome

On my screenshot above, you'll see I'm using the port 5000 instead (this because my blog is running on port 3000)

And, for the fun, here is the same but I've started Firefox in Docker in an MS-DOS environment and, then, I've used Edge instead of Chrome:

Start Firefox inside Docker in Edge

The command I've used in DOS is: docker run -d --name=firefox --security-opt seccomp=unconfined -e PUID=1000 -e PGID=1000 -e TZ=Etc/UTC -e FIREFOX_CLI=https://www.linuxserver.io/ -p 3000:3000 -p 3001:3001 -v %CD%\temp:/config --shm-size="1gb" --restart unless-stopped lscr.io/linuxserver/firefox:latest.

Start GIMP in your browser​

Another example is running GIMP in the browser. Take a look on https://github.com/linuxserver/docker-gimp?tab=readme-ov-file#docker-cli-click-here-for-more-info. You'll get there a command to start in your console.

First, make sure to create a subfolder called config and, in my example below, I'll also create a subfolder images where I've copied an avatar of a meerkat.

docker run -d \
    --name=gimp \
    --security-opt seccomp=unconfined \
    -e PUID=1000 \
    -e PGID=1000 \
    -e TZ=Etc/UTC \
    -p 3000:3000 \
    -p 3001:3001 \
    -v ./config:/config \
    -v ./images:/images \
    -w /images \
    --restart unless-stopped \
    lscr.io/linuxserver/gimp:latest

Like earlier, now, just start your browser and surf to http://localhost:3000 to start GIMP:

Running GIMP in Docker

The MS-DOS version of the CLI is: docker run -d --name=gimp --security-opt seccomp=unconfined -e PUID=1000 -e PGID=1000 -e TZ=Etc/UTC -p 3000:3000 -p 3001:3001 -v %CD%/config:/config -v ./images:/images -w /images --restart unless-stopped lscr.io/linuxserver/gimp:latest.