How to do it...

In our recipe, we will locally create a Docker Container with a Linux Ubuntu 17.10 VM to publish and host our ASP.NET Core MVC application.

In this recipe, we will do the following:

1. Before beginning, you can install Nautilus, a file manager for a gnome-like explorer on Windows, which allows you to open the Terminal by right-clicking in a folder:

$ apt-get install nautilus-open-terminal 

$ killall nautilus && nautilus

1. Download and install Docker on our Ubuntu VM:

$ sudo apt-key adv --keyserver hkp://keyserver.ubuntu.com:80 --recv-keys 36A1D7869245C8950F966E92D8576A8BA88D21E9 

$ sudo sh -c "echo deb https://get.docker.com/ubuntu docker main > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list" 

$ sudo apt-get update 

$ sudo apt-get install lxc-docker 

1. Add the current user to Docker group, then log out and log in again:

$ sudo usermod -aG docker  

$ sudo service docker restart 

1. Download project.json and Starup.cs from the HelloWeb sample, at https://github.com/aspnet/Home/tree/dev/samples/latest/HelloWeb. These two files are the only mandatory files required to run our application.
2. Create a directory named HelloWeb, and place the two previous files inside.

1. Create a file without an extension inside called Dockerfile, and insert in the following code:

# This code will download and use the last ASP.NET 5 Docker 
 # image based on Mono at 
 # https://github.com/aspnet/aspnet-docker/blob/master/1.0.0-
 # rc1-update1/Dockerfile

FROM Microsoft/aspnet:latest 

# This code copies the project into the folder and restores 
 # the packages using dotnet CLICOPY . /app
 WORKDIR /app
 RUN ["dotnet","restore"] 

# Open this port in the container 
EXPOSE 5000 

# Start application using DNX and the command from 
 # project.json to call kestrel 
ENTRYPOINT ["dotnet","run"] 

1. Save and close Dockerfile.
2. Then, verify the existing containers (not mandatory):

$ sudo docker images

1. We can also check the running containers (not mandatory):

$ docker ps

1. You can build your application now:

$ docker build -t  

1. Run it (port 5004 is the default port for Kestrel):

$ docker run -t -d -p 5004:5004 

1. You can see the home page at http:localhost:5004.