Docker service does not start

Question

docker is gigving me a hard time currently. I followed these instructions in order to install docker on my virtual server running Ubuntu 14.04 hosted by strato.de.

Answer 1

Here's what I tried/found out, hoping that it will save you some time or even help you solve it.

Docker's download script is trying to identify the kernel through uname -r to be able to install the right kernel extras for your host.

I suspect two problems:

• My (united-hoster.de) and probably your provider use customized kernel images (eg. 3.13.0-042stab108.2) for virtual hosts. Since the script is explicitly looking for -generic in the name, the lookup fails.
• While the naming problem would be easy to fix, I wasn't able to install the generic kernel extras with my hoster's custom kernel. It seems like using a upgrading the kernel does not work either, since it would affect all users/vHosts on the same physical machine. This is because the kernel is shared (stated in some support ticket).

To get around that ..

• I skipped it, hoping that Docker would work without AUFS support, but it didn't.
• I tried to force Docker to use devicemapper instead, but to no avail.

I see two options: get a dedicated host so you can mess with kernels and filesystems or a least let the docker installer do it or install the binaries manually.