nationalinstruments/nilrt-runmode-container repository overview

⁠NILRT Containers Overview:

NI Linux Real-Time (NILRT) can be built and run as an OCI/Docker container image. Instead of running NILRT on dedicated NI hardware, a container image packages the NILRT runmode userspace – including SSH, the NI System Web Server, mDNS-based discovery, and the opkg package manager – so that it runs as a container on a regular Linux/Windows host.

⁠Supported Operating Systems:

• Linux: Full NILRT container Docker & Podman support
• Windows: NILRT container Docker & Podman support without macvlan networking

⁠Available NILRT docker (or podman) images:

• nilrt-runmode-container⁠ – the full Base System Image, including DKMS and the proprietary NI software stack.

• nilrt-slim-container⁠ – a minimal Base System Image with just the core runmode userspace: no desktop packages and none of the proprietary NI software. It is smaller and faster to start; install only the NI software you need via opkg.

⁠What the Containers are for:

NILRT containers are intended for development, testing, and continuous integration workflows where running on real hardware is inconvenient or unavailable. Typical use cases include:

• Spinning up many NILRT systems quickly – for example, scaling out tens of targets for software-deployment or discovery testing.
• Validating package installs, feed configuration, and opkg workflows without reflashing hardware.
• Exercising NI MAX and VeriStand deployment flows against a discoverable, networked NILRT system.
• Reproducible CI environments that exercise NILRT userspace software.

⁠Documentation:

Full documentation of building and running NILRT containers can be found here: https://nilrt-docs.ni.com/nilrt_containers/nilrt_containers.html#running-ni-linux-real-time-in-containers⁠