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Installing Docker on Debian 13 (Trixie)

Step 1: Update the Package Index and Install Dependencies

sudo apt update
sudo apt install ca-certificates curl

Step 2: Import Docker’s Official GPG Key

sudo install -m 0755 -d /etc/apt/keyrings
sudo curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/debian/gpg -o /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.asc
sudo chmod a+r /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.asc

Step 3: Add the Docker APT Repository

echo \
  "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture) signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/docker.asc] https://download.docker.com/linux/debian trixie stable" | \
  sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list

Step 4: Install Docker Engine

sudo apt update
sudo apt install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io docker-buildx-plugin docker-compose-plugin

Verify the Docker Installation

sudo systemctl status docker

The output will look something like this:

● docker.service - Docker Application Container Engine
   Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/docker.service; enabled)
   Active: active (running)
...

Run Docker Commands Without sudo

By default, only root and users with sudo privileges can run Docker commands.
To allow a non-root user to execute Docker commands, add the user to the docker group:

sudo usermod -aG docker $USER

$USER is an environment variable that holds the currently logged-in username. To add a different user, replace $USER with the username.

Run newgrp docker or log out and log back in for the group membership change to take effect.

Verifying Docker with a Test Container

To verify that Docker is installed correctly and works without sudo , run a test container :

docker container run hello-world

If the image is not found locally, Docker will download it from Docker Hub, run the container, print a “Hello from Docker” message, and exit.

Unable to find image 'hello-world:latest' locally
latest: Pulling from library/hello-world
...
Hello from Docker!
This message shows that your installation appears to be working correctly.
...

The container stops after printing the message because it has no long-running process.

 

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