Why Docker Still Dominates: 2016 Tech Awards Highlights & Key Container Projects

Few days ago InfoWorld released its 2016 Technology of the Year Awards, highlighting that 2015 was the year of containers and saw major advances in distributed computing, in‑memory analytics, machine learning, PaaS, real‑time processing, single‑page applications, and software‑defined networking.

The 2016 winners are redefining the IT industry and business models.

The author notes that among the 31 winning products, the top ones are Docker‑related, prompting the list below.

No.1 Docker

Docker has reshaped the software industry; even VMware admits containers can outperform VMs in many scenarios, Microsoft is bringing Docker to Windows Server, and all major cloud providers are watching Docker.

No.2 Kubernetes

Kubernetes is an orchestration tool built for Docker containers, similar to Marathon on Apache Mesos. It originated at Google and runs on Google Container Engine, VMware vSphere, Mesos, DCOS, and public clouds such as AWS.

No.3 CoreOS

CoreOS is a lightweight Linux distribution designed for containers, featuring automatic and rolling updates, fleet for container scheduling, and etcd for distributed key‑value storage and service discovery.

No.6 Apache Mesos

Mesos abstracts, manages, and schedules compute resources in a distributed cluster; it powers DCOS. Companies like Twitter and Apple use Mesos for large‑scale workloads.

Other notable entries include Joyent Triton (Docker‑compatible containers on bare metal) and various projects grouped into categories such as Development Languages, Developer Tools/Services, Cloud Computing Services, and Big Data/Data Mining.

Development Languages : Python 3.5, PHP 7, Rust, React

Developer Tools/Services : Microsoft Visual Studio 2015, Slack, Salesforce1 and Lightning, Alpha Anywhere, Swagger, JetBrains PhpStorm, Apache Ambari, Cisco ACI

Cloud Computing Services : AWS Lambda, Microsoft Azure App Services, Amazon Aurora

Big Data / Data Mining : IBM Watson Analytics, Apache Spark, Splunk, Apache Kafka, Cloudera Impala, Tableau

The full list of 31 winners (in original order) is:

Docker

Kubernetes

CoreOS

Joyent Triton

Cisco ACI

Apache Mesos

Apache Spark

IBM Watson Analytics

Splunk

Tableau

Microsoft Office

Slack

Adobe Connect

Cloudera Impala

Apache Kafka

Apache Ambari

Python 3.5

PHP 7

JetBrains PhpStorm

Rust

React

RethinkDB

Raspberry Pi Zero

Red Hat OpenShift

Amazon Aurora

AWS Lambda

Microsoft Azure App Services

Microsoft Visual Studio 2015

Salesforce1 and Lightning

Alpha Anywhere

Swagger