When working behind restrictive networks, pulling Docker images often requires routing traffic through SOCKS proxies. The standard ALL_PROXY environment variable approach fails because:

• Docker daemon runs as a system service, not inheriting user shell environments
• Docker Compose makes direct HTTP requests outside the proxy context

Here are three working methods to force Docker traffic through SOCKS5:

Method 1: Docker Daemon Proxy Configuration

# Create or modify the Docker systemd configuration
sudo mkdir -p /etc/systemd/system/docker.service.d
sudo tee /etc/systemd/system/docker.service.d/http-proxy.conf << EOF
[Service]
Environment="HTTP_PROXY=socks5://127.0.0.1:8888"
Environment="HTTPS_PROXY=socks5://127.0.0.1:8888"
EOF

# Reload and restart Docker
sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl restart docker

Method 2: SSH Tunnel Wrapper

#!/bin/bash
# docker-compose-proxy.sh

# First establish SOCKS tunnel in background
ssh -f -N -D 8888 parham@remote-server

# Execute compose with proxied environment
ALL_PROXY=socks5://127.0.0.1:8888 HTTPS_PROXY=socks5://127.0.0.1:8888 \
  docker-compose up

# Cleanup tunnel when done
pkill -f "ssh -f -N -D 8888"

Method 3: Docker Client Proxy via CNTLM

# Install CNTLM and configure for SOCKS5
sudo apt install cntlm
sudo tee /etc/cntlm.conf << EOF
Username    your_username
Domain      your_domain
Proxy       127.0.0.1:8888
Listen      3128
SOCKS5Proxy yes
EOF

# Start CNTLM and configure Docker client
sudo systemctl restart cntlm
export HTTP_PROXY=http://127.0.0.1:3128
export HTTPS_PROXY=http://127.0.0.1:3128
docker-compose pull

• For Method 1, registry-specific proxies may require additional NO_PROXY settings
• Method 2 works well for temporary sessions but requires SSH key setup
• Corporate environments often block direct Docker Hub access - combine Methods 1+3

When proxy configurations fail, check these diagnostic commands:

# Verify Docker daemon environment
sudo systemctl show docker --property Environment

# Test proxy connectivity
curl --socks5 127.0.0.1:8888 https://registry-1.docker.io/v2/

# Inspect Docker client config
docker info | grep -i proxy

sudo apt-get install tsocks
echo "server = 127.0.0.1" | sudo tee -a /etc/tsocks.conf
echo "server_type = 5" | sudo tee -a /etc/tsocks.conf
echo "server_port = 8888" | sudo tee -a /etc/tsocks.conf

tsocks docker-compose up

sudo apt-get install privoxy
echo "forward-socks5 / 127.0.0.1:8888 ." | sudo tee -a /etc/privoxy/config
sudo systemctl restart privoxy

mkdir -p ~/.docker
echo '{
  "proxies": {
    "default": {
      "httpProxy": "http://127.0.0.1:8118",
      "httpsProxy": "http://127.0.0.1:8118"
    }
  }
}' > ~/.docker/config.json

sudo mkdir -p /etc/systemd/system/docker.service.d
echo '[Service]
Environment="HTTP_PROXY=http://127.0.0.1:8118"
Environment="HTTPS_PROXY=http://127.0.0.1:8118"' | sudo tee /etc/systemd/system/docker.service.d/http-proxy.conf

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl restart docker