docker-compose is a popular choice to spin up applications needing multiple containers and run them. It allows to define the configuration in a simple yaml format and with few commands, you can create/manage all your application containers at once. Podman does not have a counterpart to the docker-compose command. There is a project in the works called podman-compose, which is supposed to do the same basic thing as docker-compose.

However Podman uses a concept called pods. Pods are a way of grouping containers together inside their own namespace, network, and security context. You can start and stop the whole pod at once to manage your application.

Read More »