I built Container-Maker (cm) because I really liked the concept of "DevContainers" (defining your development environment as code in `devcontainer.json`), but I didn't want my development workflow to be tightly coupled to VS Code. I wanted a tool that felt as fast as `make` but offered the isolation of Docker, usable from any terminal or IDE.

Container-Maker is a standalone CLI tool written in Go that manages development environments.

Key features: - *Standalone:* Fully compatible with the `devcontainer.json` spec but runs independently of VS Code. - *Zero-Config:* The `cm setup` command auto-detects your OS and installs/configures the optimal runtime (Docker Desktop, Docker Engine, or Podman). - *Native Experience:* It handles signal proxying (SIGWINCH) and TTY correctly, so tools like `vim` and `htop` feel native inside the container. - *BuildKit Powered:* Leverages Docker BuildKit for aggressive layer caching to speed up environment spin-up. - *TUI Dashboard:* Includes a terminal UI (`cm status`) to manage running containers and view logs. - *Cloud Integration:* Can provision GPU instances (AWS, GCP, etc.) for AI/ML workloads directly from the CLI.

It aims to solve the "works on my machine" problem by making the container the first-class citizen for your shell.

The project is open source (AGPL-3.0).

Repo: https://github.com/UPwith-me/Container-Maker

I'd love to hear your feedback on the TUI experience and the setup flow!