The docker command uses this package to communicate with the daemon. It can also be used by your own Go applications to do anything the command-line interface does; running containers, pulling or pushing images, etc.
For example, to list all containers (the equivalent of docker ps --all):
package main import ( "context" "fmt" "github.com/moby/moby/client" ) func main() { // Create a new client with "client.FromEnv" (configuring the client // from commonly used environment variables such as DOCKER_HOST and // DOCKER_API_VERSION) and set a custom User-Agent. // // API-version negotiation is enabled by default to allow downgrading // the API version when connecting with an older daemon version. apiClient, err := client.New( client.FromEnv, client.WithUserAgent("my-application/1.0.0"), ) if err != nil { panic(err) } defer apiClient.Close() // List all containers (both stopped and running). result, err := apiClient.ContainerList(context.Background(), client.ContainerListOptions{ All: true, }) if err != nil { panic(err) } // Print each container's ID, status and the image it was created from. fmt.Printf("%s %-22s %s\n", "ID", "STATUS", "IMAGE") for _, ctr := range result.Items { fmt.Printf("%s %-22s %s\n", ctr.ID, ctr.Status, ctr.Image) } }
Full documentation is available on pkg.go.dev.