In previous chapters, we have been fiddling a lot with Docker commands to work with Docker images, containers, volumes, and networks. One of the hallmarks of Docker is the amazing user experience it provides through its easy-to-remember and well-structured commands. With a single Docker command, we can spin a very useful microservice or utility container. However, behind the scenes, the Docker client translates our request into multiple API calls in order to fulfill it. These APIs are called Docker Engine APIs, and they are designed using the REST paradigm.
Note: REST (aka RESTful) stands for REpresentational State Transfer, which is a web standard for data communication over the HTTP protocol.
The Docker Engine API is documented using the OpenAPI (formerly known as Swagger) specification. As a result, we can access API help through any standard OpenAPI editor. In...