jesseduffield/lazydocker

Lazydocker is a terminal-based visual interface for managing Docker containers and Docker Compose projects. Docker is a tool that packages software into isolated containers, but normally managing those containers means typing long commands into the terminal to check logs, restart services, or inspect resource usage. Lazydocker replaces that workflow with an interactive screen that you navigate using your keyboard, showing all your running containers, images, and volumes at a glance without needing to remember or type Docker commands. The interface is split into panels: one showing your containers or services, another showing logs in real time, and others for stats like CPU and memory usage. You can restart, stop, or remove containers by pressing a key rather than typing a command. It works with both plain Docker containers and with Docker Compose projects, where multiple containers are defined together as a group of services. The tool is read-heavy and designed for monitoring and quick management actions, not for building or configuring containers from scratch. You would use lazydocker when you have several Docker containers running on your machine, perhaps a database, a backend server, and a cache, and you want a quick way to glance at their health, tail their logs, or restart one without context-switching to type out full Docker commands. It is particularly popular among developers who already spend time in the terminal and want a faster, more visual workflow than the Docker CLI provides. The tech stack is Go, using the gocui library to draw the terminal user interface, and it can be installed via Homebrew on macOS, or downloaded as a binary for Linux and Windows.