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There is a setting when you click the sprocket on the right of the bottom tab in Kitematic. What does it do exactly? What is the difference between Native and VirtualBox?

unom
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Use VirtualBox instead of Native means Kitematic will use the VirtualBox based virtualization technology instead of Native virtualization technology.

For example, when you install Docker for Mac, the Kitematic that comes with it uses the native VM created based on HyperKit technology (See the The Docker for Mac Environment section in this link for context at https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-mac/docker-toolbox/#the-docker-for-mac-environment).

If you instead want Kitematic to use the Virtual Box VM, then turn this setting on. It boots the default Virtual Box VM (uses the boot2docker image) and connects to the dockerd running in it.

Srikanth N
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  • From what I understand "Native" will try to connect to the installed Docker app which uses "containers" directly with the host OS via HyperKit (around 50mb ram doing nothing and max 2GB, depending on settings, of hardware resources) while using VirtualBox actually loads a linux virtual machine with VirtualBox and loads containers on that (thus using the max 2GB of ram, all the time, of hardware resources). Is this right? – unom Mar 04 '18 at 08:28
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    Yes (I don't know the RAM limit of hyperkit based VM but the concept is right). I tried the switch and asked Kitematic to use Virtual box instead of native and it launched a virtual box default VM and interacted with the docker running in it. Kitematic is a UI for interacting with docker, docker hub etc. and depending on which VM you choose either it will connect to the docker machine on a virtual box or docker on the native vm. – Srikanth N Mar 04 '18 at 14:39