[ubuntu] Allow docker container to connect to a local/host postgres database

I've recently been playing around with Docker and QGIS and have installed a container following the instructions in this tutorial.

Everything works great, although I am unable to connect to a localhost postgres database that contains all my GIS data. I figure this is because my postgres database is not configured to accept remote connections and have been editing the postgres conf files to allow remote connections using the instructions in this article.

I'm still getting an error message when I try and connect to my database running QGIS in Docker: could not connect to server: Connection refused Is the server running on host "localhost" (::1) and accepting TCP/IP connections to port 5433? The postgres server is running, and I've edited my pg_hba.conf file to allow connections from a range of IP addresses (172.17.0.0/32). I had previously queried the IP address of the docker container using docker ps and although the IP address changes, it has so far always been in the range 172.17.0.x

Any ideas why I can't connect to this database? Probably something very simple I imagine!

I'm running Ubuntu 14.04; Postgres 9.3

Simple solution

Just add --network=host to docker run. That's all!

This way container will use the host's network, so localhost and 127.0.0.1 will point to the host (by default they point to a container). Example:

docker run -d --network=host \
  -e "DB_DBNAME=your_db" \
  -e "DB_PORT=5432" \
  -e "DB_USER=your_db_user" \
  -e "DB_PASS=your_db_password" \
  -e "DB_HOST=127.0.0.1" \
  --name foobar foo/bar

One more thing needed for my setup was to add

172.17.0.1  localhost

to /etc/hosts

so that Docker would point to 172.17.0.1 as the DB hostname, and not rely on a changing outer ip to find the DB. Hope this helps someone else with this issue!

The another solution is service volume, You can define a service volume and mount host's PostgreSQL Data directory in that volume. Check out the given compose file for details.

version: '2'
services:
  db:   
    image: postgres:9.6.1
    volumes:
      - "/var/lib/postgresql/data:/var/lib/postgresql/data" 
    ports:
      - "5432:5432"

By doing this, another PostgreSQL service will run under container but uses same data directory which host PostgreSQL service is using.

To set up something simple that allows a Postgresql connection from the docker container to my localhost I used this in postgresql.conf:

listen_addresses = '*'

And added this pg_hba.conf:

host    all             all             172.17.0.0/16           password

Then do a restart. My client from the docker container (which was at 172.17.0.2) could then connect to Postgresql running on my localhost using host:password, database, username and password.

In Ubuntu:

First You have to check that is the Docker Database port is Available in your system by following command -

sudo iptables -L -n

Sample OUTPUT:

Chain DOCKER (1 references)
target     prot opt source               destination         
ACCEPT     tcp  --  0.0.0.0/0            172.17.0.2           tcp dpt:3306
ACCEPT     tcp  --  0.0.0.0/0            172.17.0.3           tcp dpt:80
ACCEPT     tcp  --  0.0.0.0/0            172.17.0.3           tcp dpt:22

Here 3306 is used as Docker Database Port on 172.17.0.2 IP, If this port is not available Run the following command -

sudo iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 3306 -j ACCEPT

Now, You can easily access the Docker Database from your local system by following configuration

  host: 172.17.0.2 
  adapter: mysql
  database: DATABASE_NAME
  port: 3307
  username: DATABASE_USER
  password: DATABASE_PASSWORD
  encoding: utf8

In CentOS:

First You have to check that is the Docker Database port is Available in your firewall by following command -

sudo firewall-cmd --list-all

Sample OUTPUT:

  target: default
  icmp-block-inversion: no
  interfaces: eno79841677
  sources: 
  services: dhcpv6-client ssh
  **ports: 3307/tcp**
  protocols: 
  masquerade: no
  forward-ports: 
  sourceports: 
  icmp-blocks: 
  rich rules:

Here 3307 is used as Docker Database Port on 172.17.0.2 IP, If this port is not available Run the following command -

sudo firewall-cmd --zone=public --add-port=3307/tcp

In server, You can add the port permanently

sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-port=3307/tcp
sudo firewall-cmd --reload

Now, You can easily access the Docker Database from your local system by the above configuration.

Docker for Mac solution

17.06 onwards

Thanks to @Birchlabs' comment, now it is tons easier with this special Mac-only DNS name available:

docker run -e DB_PORT=5432 -e DB_HOST=docker.for.mac.host.internal

From 17.12.0-cd-mac46, docker.for.mac.host.internal should be used instead of docker.for.mac.localhost. See release note for details.

Older version

@helmbert's answer well explains the issue. But Docker for Mac does not expose the bridge network, so I had to do this trick to workaround the limitation:

$ sudo ifconfig lo0 alias 10.200.10.1/24

Open /usr/local/var/postgres/pg_hba.conf and add this line:

host    all             all             10.200.10.1/24            trust

Open /usr/local/var/postgres/postgresql.conf and edit change listen_addresses:

listen_addresses = '*'

Reload service and launch your container:

$ PGDATA=/usr/local/var/postgres pg_ctl reload
$ docker run -e DB_PORT=5432 -e DB_HOST=10.200.10.1 my_app 

What this workaround does is basically same with @helmbert's answer, but uses an IP address that is attached to lo0 instead of docker0 network interface.

The solution posted here does not work for me. Therefore, I am posting this answer to help someone facing similar issue.

OS: Ubuntu 18
PostgreSQL: 9.5 (Hosted on Ubuntu)
Docker: Server Application (which connects to PostgreSQL)

I am using docker-compose.yml to build application.

STEP 1: Please add host.docker.internal:<docker0 IP>

version: '3'
services:
  bank-server:
    ...
    depends_on:
      ....
    restart: on-failure
    ports:
      - 9090:9090
    extra_hosts:
      - "host.docker.internal:172.17.0.1"

To find IP of docker i.e. 172.17.0.1 (in my case) you can use:

$> ifconfig docker0
docker0: flags=4099<UP,BROADCAST,MULTICAST>  mtu 1500
        inet 172.17.0.1  netmask 255.255.0.0  broadcast 172.17.255.255

OR

$> ip a
1: docker0: <NO-CARRIER,BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP> mtu 1500 qdisc noqueue state DOWN group default
    inet 172.17.0.1/16 brd 172.17.255.255 scope global docker0
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever

STEP 2: In postgresql.conf, change listen_addresses to listen_addresses = '*'

STEP 3: In pg_hba.conf, add this line

host    all             all             0.0.0.0/0               md5

STEP 4: Now restart postgresql service using, sudo service postgresql restart

STEP 5: Please use host.docker.internal hostname to connect database from Server Application.
Ex: jdbc:postgresql://host.docker.internal:5432/bankDB

Enjoy!!

for docker-compose you can try just add

network_mode: "host"

example :

version: '2'
services:
  feedx:
    build: web
    ports:
    - "127.0.0.1:8000:8000"
    network_mode: "host"

https://docs.docker.com/compose/compose-file/#network_mode

Simple Solution for mac:

The newest version of docker (18.03) offers a built in port forwarding solution. Inside your docker container simply have the db host set to host.docker.internal. This will be forwarded to the host the docker container is running on.

Documentation for this is here: https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-mac/networking/#i-want-to-connect-from-a-container-to-a-service-on-the-host