Testing Docker

Testing Docker#

Once you have Docker installed, you should test it with the software you plan to use.

These instructions are provided as command-line examples, as this abstracts away from any differences in graphical user interfaces. You may be able to figure out as well how to do this with a GUI, we have not tested that.

Pre-requisites#

You need to have Docker (engine) installed, or an equivalent (compatible) system.

Testing a R image#

  • Open a terminal and type.:

VERSION=4.4.3
TYPE=r-ver

docker run --rm rocker/$TYPE:$VERSION R --version

or for something a bit more complicated

docker run --rm  rocker/$TYPE:$VERSION Rscript -e "Sys.info()"

which should generate something like this:

                                              sysname
                                              "Linux"
                                              release
                   "6.6.87.2-microsoft-standard-WSL2"
                                              version
"#1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Thu Jun  5 18:30:46 UTC 2025"
                                             nodename
                                       "fd2497260a3c"
                                              machine
                                             "x86_64"
                                                login
                                            "unknown"
                                                 user
                                               "root"
                                       effective_user
                                               "root"


                                                        sysname
                                                        "Linux"
                                                        release
                                   "6.4.0-150600.23.60-default"
                                                        version
"#1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Tue Jul  1 14:43:49 UTC 2025 (6f98261)"
                                                       nodename
                                                 "c295b531b0e7"
                                                        machine
                                                       "x86_64"
                                                          login
                                                      "unknown"
                                                           user
                                                         "root"
                                                 effective_user
                                                         "root"

coming.

Testing a Stata image#

In order to run Stata, you need to have a Stata license, as installed on your existing system. This can be in a few locations. Replace $STATALIC with the path to your Stata license file:

  • Windows: C:\Program Files\Stata17\stata.lic or C:\Program Files (x86)\Stata17\stata.lic

  • MacOS: /Applications/Stata/Stata.lic

  • Linux: /usr/local/stata/stata.lic or /usr/local/stata17/stata.lic

STATALIC="/path/to/stata.lic"
VERSION=16
TAG=2023-06-13

NOTE: Regardless of your current license, say for Stata 19Now, we will run the test with Stata 16! Your license file will work for all lower versions of Stata.

Then, to test the Stata installation, run the following in a terminal.

docker run -it --rm \
   -v "$STATALIC":/usr/local/stata/stata.lic \
   --entrypoint "stata" \
    dataeditors/stata$VERSION:$TAG \
    exit, STATA

This should start and then immediately exit Stata:

> docker run -it --rm \
>    -v "$STATALIC":/usr/local/stata/stata.lic \
>    --entrypoint "stata" \
>     dataeditors/stata$VERSION:$TAG \
>     exit, STATA

Unable to find image 'dataeditors/stata16:2023-06-13' locally
2023-06-13: Pulling from dataeditors/stata16
56e0351b9876: Already exists
2523c6655958: Pull complete
cfc7dba720bb: Pull complete
58680fd4cb1a: Pull complete
6116d32e100f: Pull complete
7fe335012735: Pull complete
Digest: sha256:cbc369637c6463ad32d7914326009c14f42524729079d1f88d8fbb197abed4c2
Status: Downloaded newer image for dataeditors/stata16:2023-06-13

  ___  ____  ____  ____  ____ (R)
 /__    /   ____/   /   ____/
___/   /   /___/   /   /___/   16.1   Copyright 1985-2019 StataCorp LLC
  Statistics/Data analysis            StataCorp
                                      4905 Lakeway Drive
                                      College Station, Texas 77845 USA
                                      800-STATA-PC        https://www.stata.com
                                      979-696-4600        stata@stata.com
                                      979-696-4601 (fax)

Stata license: (your info here)
Serial number: (your serial number here)
  Licensed to: (your info here)

Notes:
      1. Unicode is supported; see help unicode_advice.

. exit, STATA
>

Caution: Stata docker images and licenses#

The AEA Data Editor has maintained the Stata images at AEADataEditor/docker-stata. In order to use a version that is equivalent to yours (or lower), you need to

  • understand which version your Stata license applies to (e.g., Stata 19 and Stata 19Now licenses are different licenses)

  • which “size” of Stata you have (IC, SE, MP) (IC maps into the executable stata on Linux, SE into stata-se, and MP into stata-mp)

  • which “tag” you want to use. The tags are dates that correspond to the born date in Stata, i.e., the update. Versions that are under active maintenance will have multiple tags; versions that are out of maintenance (e.g., Stata 16) will also have a latest tag that corresponds to the last update (and can be ommitted).

Next steps#

Once you have verified that Docker works with the software of your choice, you can move on to running all your code through Docker. In general, you do NOT need to rebuild the Docker image (a somewhat more advanced topic), but will need to map your project directory into the Docker container, and install any user-created packages or libraries as part of your code. In some cases, images might be available that already include commonly used packages, for instance the various rocker images for R.

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