Containerize your Java application with Docker for easy deployment to the cloud.
Deployment is the process of getting your application running in a production environment. Modern deployment practices heavily rely on containerization, and Docker is the leading platform for this. A container is a lightweight, standalone, executable package that includes everything needed to run a piece of software: the code, a runtime (like the JRE), system tools, and libraries. Docker allows you to define the environment for your application in a text file called a `Dockerfile`. The Dockerfile contains instructions to build a Docker image. This image is a blueprint for your containers. For a Java application, the Dockerfile would typically start from a base image that has Java installed, copy your application's JAR file into the image, and specify the command to run the JAR file. The key benefit of this approach is that a Docker container runs the same way regardless of the underlying infrastructure. This solves the classic 'it works on my machine' problem. Once you have a Docker image, you can run it as a container on any machine that has Docker installed, from a developer's laptop to a production server. This consistency makes deployment much simpler and more reliable. Cloud platforms like Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and Microsoft Azure provide services specifically designed to run and manage Docker containers at scale (e.g., AWS ECS, Google Kubernetes Engine). By containerizing your Java application, you make it portable and ready for modern, cloud-native deployment.