# Pros and cons of installing Discourse on a NON-virtual machine?

**URL:** <https://meta.discourse.org/t/pros-and-cons-of-installing-discourse-on-a-non-virtual-machine/13677>\
**Category:** Self-hosting\
**Tags:** hosting\
**Created:** [2014 年 3 月 12 日午後 8:24 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/pros-and-cons-of-installing-discourse-on-a-non-virtual-machine/13677 "2014-03-12T20:24:47Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 4

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**Author:** ![snarke](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/snarke/32/3903_2.png) [@snarke](https://meta.discourse.org/u/snarke)\
**Post date:** [2014 年 3 月 12 日午後 10:09 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/pros-and-cons-of-installing-discourse-on-a-non-virtual-machine/13677/4 "2014-03-12T22:09:04Z")

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Ah. “Docker?” I said to myself. “What’s that got to do with anything?” Bear with me here, I’m a part-time programmer. (More accurately, I’m a one-man band; I manufacture and sell small objects made from atoms with no moving parts. The servers I run and the software I write mostly go to support my business, so I have to be very careful about what I take time to learn. If I haven’t already needed it, I probably don’t know much about it.)

I went looking for the installation document that I’d referred to previously. Going to GitHub led me to both “Discourse As Your First Rails App” and, just a bit further down, the “Discourse Installation Guide”.

The Installation Guide says “The only officially supported installs of Discourse are the Docker based beginner and advanced installs, above. We regret that we cannot directly support any other methods of installation.” Seems fair.

However, what I’d seen previously (and I’m not sure the Installation Guide was even there when I did) was the “…First Rails App” document, which makes no mention of Docker at all. True, the Rails App is described as what one does for setting up a development server, and the Installation Guide is supposed to be for a production server.

Still, wouldn’t I make my life simpler by just using the Docker containerized install twice, once for the dev install and once for the production install?

Particularly since it appears that the mildly complex process of installing VirtualBox detailed in the “Rails App” document isn’t an officially supported way of doing it (any more?).

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