Build and Customize your own Oracle 23ai Docker Image and deploy customer containers

If you're a developer or a database enthusiast looking to explore Oracle Database 23 AI capabilities, Docker provides an easy and flexible way to get started. Oracle 23 AI introduces powerful artificial intelligence features, and running it in a Docker container gives you the flexibility to test and experiment without needing a dedicated environment.

In this guide, I’ll walk you through the process of downloading the Oracle 23 AI Docker container image, running it with a volume, customizing the container to fit your needs, and finally committing those changes to a new container image.

What You’ll Need:

• Docker installed on your system.
• A basic understanding of Docker commands.
• Access to the internet to download the container image.

Step 1: Download the Oracle Database 23 AI Container Image

Oracle provides the official Docker image of Oracle Database 23 AI, and you can find it on GitHub at https://github.com/gvenzl/oci-oracle-free.

To begin, download (pull) the Oracle 23 AI image from GitHub.

Command to pull and run the Oracle 23 AI Free image:

docker run -d -p 1521:1521 --name anil23ai -e ORACLE_PASSWORD=oracle -v oracle-volume:/opt/oracle/oradata gvenzl/oracle-free        

Note: If 1521 is already taken, I would recommend using a non-default port from the host port:containerport like 1577:1521

In Docker Desktop, you should see something like this on the Image section and Container section.

[Image Section]

[Container Section]

Let us now use the Logs section of the container to view that everything is working fine

Now let us login in under the Exec section, to connect to the Oracle 23ai system

sqlplus / as sysdba        

Now for the fun part... Customizing this container to our needs.

I have gone ahead and created the following two tables [EMP and DEPT] as this is a test environment.

from Oracle Live SQL - Script: EMP and DEPT

Now let's commit the changes to the container.

Let's view the container name details by running docker ps

docker ps        

Docker Commit

docker commit anil23ai anil23ai:v1        

Now let's make sure the new container image is present by running docker images

docker images        

Congratulations! You have created your own custom docker image from an existing one.

In the next series, we will explore more customization options.