17.4 Docker Basics

Docker packages your application — the model, its code, libraries, and exact dependency versions — into a single 'container' that runs the same way on your laptop, a colleague's machine, or a cloud server. This solves the classic 'but it works on my computer' problem by freezing the whole environment, not just the code.

A team in Mekelle trains a model that needs a very specific TensorFlow version. On the new server it kept crashing due to a library mismatch. After wrapping it in a Docker image, the exact same versions ship together, so it runs cleanly on every machine with no manual setup.