Docker

Primary command

sentinel docker

Sentinel auto-discovers Docker containers and triages their logs without manual piping.

Selection behavior

Sentinel chooses targets in this order:

1. if the current directory looks like a Docker Compose project and that stack has running containers, watch that stack
2. otherwise, watch all running containers in the active Docker context
3. if explicit container names are provided, skip auto-discovery and use only those containers

Useful variants

Watch everything running in the current Docker context:

sentinel docker --all-running

Watch specific containers:

sentinel docker api worker redis

Introspection commands

See what Sentinel would watch right now:

sentinel docker list

Explain why a container is or is not being watched:

sentinel docker explain
sentinel docker explain redis

These commands are useful when Docker auto-discovery feels ambiguous or when you want to confirm that Sentinel is scoped to the right Compose project or context.

When to use stdin instead

If you already have a preferred Docker logs command and want to keep it:

docker logs -f api | sentinel stdin

That path still works well, but sentinel docker is the simpler default when you are running multiple containers locally.