BOOTC-OVERVIEW(7)

🌸 BOOTC-OVERVIEW(7) 🌸

okay bestie, settle in, because this one is the vibe overview of bootc — it's filed under Misc Information Manual and it's kind of a big deal 💖

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✨ NAME ✨

bootc-overview — literally just bootc, that's the whole name, no notes 💅

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🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

So what IS this? It's transactional, in-place operating system updates delivered through OCI/Docker container images. Yes fr fr, your OS updates arrive as container images. And bootc is the key component in a way bigger mission than just that — the whole bootable containers thing over at https://containers.github.io/bootable/ 👑

Now, the origin story: the classic Docker container model, where you use "layers" to model your applications? Iconic. Legendary. Extremely successful. This project is like "okay but what if we did that same trick for bootable host systems" — using standard OCI/Docker containers as the transport and delivery format for base operating system updates. Same technique, new target, chef's kiss 🧑🍳

And here's the part that trips people up, so pay attention bestie:

The container image includes a Linux kernel (living in, like, /usr/lib/modules), and that kernel is what gets used to boot. But at runtime on a target system, the base userspace is not itself running in a container by default. None of that. For example, assuming systemd is in use, systemd just acts as pid1 like it always does — there is no "outer" process. No container wrapper hovering above everything. It's just... the system 💀✨

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💜 Status 💜

Good news era: the CLI and API for bootc are now considered stable. Every existing system can be upgraded in place seamlessly across any future changes. No cap, no migration panic, just vibes 🫶

However — and this is the "however" you don't skip — the default storage backend uses the ostree project (https://github.com/ostreedev/ostree), which has been powering stable operating system updates for many years. When we say "stability" here, we generally mean the surface APIs, not the underlying logic. Important distinction, bestie, don't conflate them 🙈

There's also a composefs backend (peep bootc-composefs(7) for that one), and heads up: it's required for sealed images. So if sealed images are your thing, that backend isn't optional, it's mandatory 🌸

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🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

• bootc(8)
• bootc-composefs(7)
• bootc-docs(7)

go read those too, I know you will 💖

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🎀 VERSION 🎀

v1.17.1

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and that's the whole page, bestie!! signed off from the Miscellaneous Information Manual corner of the internet, where this lil overview lives as BOOTC-OVERVIEW(7) and the version tag is sitting pretty at v1.17.1 ⭐ see you in the next manpage, mwah 💋