Compose guide

WSLc Desktop Manager reads a standard compose file and translates it into wslc commands. It supports the common subset and tells you, before anything runs, about every key it can't honour. See Stacks for the UI.

Sample file

name: demo-stack

services:
  web:
    image: nginx:alpine
    ports:
      - "8081:80"
    volumes:
      - site-data:/usr/share/nginx/html
    networks:
      - front
    depends_on:
      - cache
    environment:
      APP_ENV: demo
    # Not supported by WSLc: the app shows a warning and starts the container anyway.
    restart: unless-stopped

  cache:
    image: redis:alpine
    networks:
      - front

networks:
  front:

volumes:
  site-data:

Download compose.yaml. With project name demo-stack, this creates the network demo-stack_front, the volume demo-stack_site-data, then runs demo-stack-cache and demo-stack-web (after cache). The restart: unless-stopped key becomes an app-level restart policy.

Naming

• The project name comes from name:, or the folder name, and can be edited in the preview.
• Containers are named <project>-<service> unless container_name is set.
• Networks and volumes are named <project>_<key> unless they set name: or are external: true.
• If no network is declared, services join <project>_default.

Supported service keys

image, build (context, dockerfile, args, target), command, entrypoint, environment, env_file, working_dir, user, ports, expose, volumes, networks, network_mode, healthcheck, mem_limit, cpus, depends_on, container_name, hostname, domainname, labels, stop_signal, stop_grace_period, tty, stdin_open, shm_size, tmpfs, dns, dns_search, pull_policy, restart (applied by the app, see restart policies).

${VAR} interpolation and x- extension keys are accepted. Services start in depends_on order, waiting for health where a healthcheck is defined.

Top-level networks support driver, internal, driver_opts, labels, ipam (subnet, gateway, ip_range) and external. Top-level volumes support driver, driver_opts, labels and external.

Unsupported keys (warnings)

Key	What happens
deploy	Replicas, resources and placement are ignored; one container starts.
scale	One container is started.
profiles	Ignored; the service always starts.
configs	Not mounted. Top-level configs are ignored.
secrets	Supported as environment variables, including file:/environment: sources that can be imported into a stored secret; missing secrets are created in the Up dialog. See Secrets.
extends, top-level include	Not resolved.
links	Use networks and service names instead.
platform	Platform selection isn't supported.

Any other unknown key is ignored with a warning. Problems such as a service with no image or build, a missing required env_file, or a dependency cycle are reported as errors and block Up.