Centos official base docker image running out of space

I thought docker images use the underlying filesystem to create their own filesystem. However, I am installing some packages through "rvm requirements" that results in an error.

The error is Insufficient space in download directory /var/cache/yum/x86_64/6/centosplus/packages

I wonder whats the problem here.


I experienced this exact error on Windows (8.1) while trying to run a new Dockerfile with docker-machine. The fix for me was to remove all dangling docker images to free up some space on the docker VM.

Executing docker ps -qa will list all dangling images: fa2c0a66ee94 e815198f0d6e ... 7e925483e67f e524267e8a9a

Executing docker rm $(docker ps -qa) will reclaim the space used by dangling images: $ docker rm $(docker ps -qa) fa2c0a66ee94 e815198f0d6e ... 7e925483e67f e524267e8a9a


Check the disk space available on the host machine/VM for directory /tmp using df -h and ls -la /.

If you are using docker-machine (OSX), then you might want to create a larger host VM with docker-machine create --driver virtualbox --virtualbox-disk-size 50000 [name].