# Running containerd as a non-root user

A non-root user can execute containerd by using [`user_namespaces(7)`](http://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man7/user_namespaces.7.html).

For example [RootlessKit](https://github.com/rootless-containers/rootlesskit) can be used for setting up a user namespace (along with mount namespace and optionally network namespace). Please refer to RootlessKit documentation for further information.

See also https://rootlesscontaine.rs/ .

## "Easy way"

The easiest way is to use `containerd-rootless-setuptool.sh` included in [containerd/nerdctl](https://github.com/containerd/nerdctl).

```console
$ containerd-rootless-setuptool.sh install
$ nerdctl run -d --restart=always --name nginx -p 8080:80 nginx:alpine
```

See https://github.com/containerd/nerdctl/blob/master/docs/rootless.md for the further information.

## "Hard way"

Click here to show the "hard way"

### Daemon

```console
$ rootlesskit --net=slirp4netns --copy-up=/etc --copy-up=/run \
  --state-dir=/run/user/1001/rootlesskit-containerd \
  sh -c "rm -f /run/containerd; exec containerd -c config.toml"
```

* `--net=slirp4netns --copy-up=/etc` is only required when you want to unshare network namespaces.
  See [RootlessKit documentation](https://github.com/rootless-containers/rootlesskit/blob/v0.14.1/docs/network.md) for the further information about the network drivers.
* `--copy-up=/DIR` mounts a writable tmpfs on `/DIR` with symbolic links to the files under the `/DIR` on the parent namespace
  so that the user can add/remove files under `/DIR` in the mount namespace.
  `--copy-up=/etc` and `--copy-up=/run` are needed on typical setup.
  Depending on the containerd plugin configuration, you may also need to add more `--copy-up` options.
* `rm -f /run/containerd` removes the "copied-up" symbolic link to `/run/containerd` on the parent namespace (if exists), which cannot be accessed by non-root users.
  The actual `/run/containerd` directory on the host is not affected.
* `--state-dir` is set to a random directory under `/tmp` if unset. RootlessKit writes the PID to a file named `child_pid` under this directory.
* You need to provide `config.toml` with your own path configuration. e.g.
```toml
version = 2
root = "/home/penguin/.local/share/containerd"
state = "/run/user/1001/containerd"

[grpc]
  address = "/run/user/1001/containerd/containerd.sock"
```

### Client

A client program such as `ctr` also needs to be executed inside the daemon namespaces.
```console
$ nsenter -U --preserve-credentials -m -n -t $(cat /run/user/1001/rootlesskit-containerd/child_pid)
$ export CONTAINERD_ADDRESS=/run/user/1001/containerd/containerd.sock
$ export CONTAINERD_SNAPSHOTTER=native
$ ctr images pull docker.io/library/ubuntu:latest
$ ctr run -t --rm --fifo-dir /tmp/foo-fifo --cgroup "" docker.io/library/ubuntu:latest foo
```

* The `overlayfs` snapshotter does not work inside user namespaces before kernel 5.11, except on Ubuntu and Debian kernels.
  However, [`fuse-overlayfs` snapshotter](https://github.com/containerd/fuse-overlayfs-snapshotter) can be used instead if running kernel >= 4.18.
* Enabling cgroup requires cgroup v2 and systemd, e.g. `ctr run --cgroup "user.slice:foo:bar" --runc-systemd-cgroup ...` .
  See also [runc documentation](https://github.com/opencontainers/runc/blob/v1.0.0-rc93/docs/cgroup-v2.md).

