Docker version of launchbox?

[ae86oni]

Hey,

 

Has anyone thought about or started working on a docker container version of lunchbox? I'm running Unraid (a Linux based os) and would absolutely love a lunchbox container! The only retro gaming container I've found is nowhere near as good as Lunchbox!

Might be an easier way to run it on all the various flavors of Linux with less headache possibly?

[Knowcontrol]

LB can only be run on Windows and therefore a container would need to have Windows as the underlying OS and since Windows isn't free then that isn't an option for distribution. IF LB is ever developed for Linux then yes a Docker container would definitely be possible.

Edited July 27, 2023 by Knowcontrol

[ae86oni]

4 hours ago, Knowcontrol said:

LB can only be run on Windows and therefore a container would need to have Windows as the underlying OS and since Windows isn't free then that isn't an option for distribution. IF LB is ever developed for Linux then yes a Docker container would definitely be possible.

What about the Android version of Launchbox with something like this possibly? 

https://github.com/budtmo/docker-android

 

Or this

https://github.com/sickcodes/dock-droid/blob/master/README.md

Edited July 27, 2023 by ae86oni
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[Fursphere]

As someone who administers Kubernetes (amongst many other things) for a living, I'm not sure I see any benefits to putting LB into a container, especially with how big LB installs can get with all the media.

[ae86oni]

On 7/28/2023 at 3:07 PM, Fursphere said:

As someone who administers Kubernetes (amongst many other things) for a living, I'm not sure I see any benefits to putting LB into a container, especially with how big LB installs can get with all the media.

From my understanding of Docker, basically any container should work across any distro of linux without issue since the container itself will run it's own instance of linux that the software in the container is optimized for. If that's the case, wouldn't it be better for a Linux version of Launchbox to be on docker? There should be little to no compatibility issues correct?

All the media doesn't have to be in the container. I run Unraid, which has docker. I run Plex and a bunch of other containers. All my media and files used are stored on the array separate from the containers. 

Edited August 2, 2023 by ae86oni

[Fursphere]

Yes, the idea of a container is universal compatibility.  An abstraction of the application from the operating system.   Generally anything should work.  

But its also kinda of geared towards shared environments where multiple applications can run, but have some amount of isolation from others.  And the resources can be governed per container (per app if you will).  One app cannot suicide another (or the OS itself), which is a common problem on Windows.  One app goes stupid and kills the whole system. 

As Launchbox is not an enterprise app, and is intended to be used on somewhat dedicated systems, I'm still not seeing the benefit to running LB in a container. 

Containers run headless.   Launchbox is not an HTTP app.  So..  how will you access LB running in a container? 

 

[ae86oni]

3 hours ago, Fursphere said:

Yes, the idea of a container is universal compatibility.  An abstraction of the application from the operating system.   Generally anything should work.  

But its also kinda of geared towards shared environments where multiple applications can run, but have some amount of isolation from others.  And the resources can be governed per container (per app if you will).  One app cannot suicide another (or the OS itself), which is a common problem on Windows.  One app goes stupid and kills the whole system. 

As Launchbox is not an enterprise app, and is intended to be used on somewhat dedicated systems, I'm still not seeing the benefit to running LB in a container. 

Containers run headless.   Launchbox is not an HTTP app.  So..  how will you access LB running in a container? 

 

You can definitely run GUI programs in Docker. almost all of the containers I run have GUIs. Am reading about setting them up and you just change a display value to allow it. 

The whole point I'm making is the isolation of Lb. Set it up to work in Docker and it will run on basically any Linux distro. I (and I'm sure many others) will gladly pay for another license to be able to run it on Docker!

I also think it would be great if a docker version was available because you could run a server on your network that hosts Launch Box, emulators and roms. Then have an app for your streaming box that kind of mimics steam link. you can play all your games via Big Box from your living room. Would be a killer solution I think.

For Unraid (Linux based), I go to my Unraid GUI and click the Docker tab, select which Container I want to open, hit open and it's GUI pops up in a new browser tab.  

Edited August 2, 2023 by ae86oni

[Fursphere]

You might run into an interesting problems with all the emulators, unless you put them into the container as well.  The container won't be able to talk to them unless you make some kind of interface / api that the container calls, since the applications outside the container will be isolated.  Or mount them inside the container I guess?    But at that point, you haven't really isolated anything, have you? 

I dunno.  Just thinking out loud here.

[ae86oni]

42 minutes ago, Fursphere said:

You might run into an interesting problems with all the emulators, unless you put them into the container as well.  The container won't be able to talk to them unless you make some kind of interface / api that the container calls, since the applications outside the container will be isolated.  Or mount them inside the container I guess?    But at that point, you haven't really isolated anything, have you? 

I dunno.  Just thinking out loud here.

I understand what you're saying. The emulators would be a bit a bit challenging unless they were all packaged together like batocera, retropie or Lakka do. Possibly start with certain ones, and add more as updates down the road? Isolated to a certain extent I guess... to where it's just an emulation station-esk docker and that's all it does. I'm in a bunch of Unraid communities and a lot of people there would love a great emulation docker option. 

Edited August 2, 2023 by ae86oni

[Nixx]

I have though of something kinda like that using https://github.com/jamesstringerparsec/Easy-GPU-PV
Make an Hyper V Virtual maching running on my PC and sharing my gpu resources, it would run a clone of my launchbox so when i'm working on my PC, wife & kids can still access to my launchbox from an other client using parsec.

Sadly, i got a technical issue and i was not able to share my AMD gpu resources to my VM, only my IGPU and that's not good enough, so i did not go further.

Edit : Ah, sorry, it was a linux related post, my stuff is for windows.

Edited August 5, 2023 by Nixx