Docker Captains are leaders from the developer community that are both experts in their field and are passionate about sharing their Docker knowledge with others. “From the Captain’s Chair” is a blog series where we get a closer look at one Captain to learn more about them and their experiences.
Today we are interviewing Naga Santhosh Reddy Vootukuri, known by his nickname Sunny. Sunny is a Principal Software Engineering Manager at Microsoft Azure SQL organization with 17+ years of experience in building cloud distributed scalable systems. He’s also a Dapr Meteor and an open-source contributor to Dapr and Microcks, both highly recognized CNCF projects.
Sunny is also an IEEE Senior member and conducts various IEEE conferences in Seattle, presents workshops and is a regular conference speaker sharing his expertise on Cloud computing, Microservices, Docker and AI related topics. He regularly blogs at DZone as an MVB core member about various topics ranging from Docker, Github Actions, Cloud Native Microservices, Dapr etc. and also published three books on topics like Azure Container Apps, Aspire and Github Copilot.
Can you share how you first got involved with Docker?
My Docker journey began back in 2016 during my time in Shanghai, China. I just moved from Microsoft India to Microsoft Shanghai to join the SQL Server Integration services team in 2015, which is a core ETL product. Being an expat, I was searching for some local community events to go and try out networking. During one of the local meet ups, an engineer from Alibaba or Tencent (I don’t remember exactly) presented a talk on Docker and I remember he mentioned that as a developer you can forget using this sentence as an excuse with your Test teams: “It works on my machine”. I got super fascinated by his talk and demos which made me want to read and go hands-on with Docker and Docker Desktop (also the timing was perfect that Docker Desktop for Windows support had recently launched). Since then, Docker has become like a part of my DNA.
What inspired you to become a Docker Captain?
I think my love towards sharing knowledge and having a stronger community is what got me started with writing blogs and speaking at conferences. During a conference where I was presenting on Docker, I met a few friends who were Docker Captains, and they informed me about the Docker Captains program and the perks they got as Docker Captains (from talking to product teams, trying out new features first-hand to traveling to summits). I immediately applied once I came back home. It took more than a month to receive an email for a Captain’s interview and I hope I impressed Eva Bojorges (Docker community lead) about my passion and my contributions towards the Docker community. Super happy to complete one year as Docker Captain (soonish) and looking forward to many more years.
I was super elated when Docker invited me to their Captains Summit in Istanbul (2025) as I was in their top 20 list of active contributions month over month. This trip was a memorable one as I met Docker product team and also talented Docker Captains across the world. Also, I can’t forget when I experienced my first hot air balloon ride (my friend from Germany took that pic, when I was busy with my Go Pro).
What are some of your personal goals for the year 2026?
There are few interesting goals I set aside to challenge myself:
- Writing a couple more technical books. I have finished three books in the last two years and currently two are in the proposal stage and the expected titles are “Docker Loves AI” and “Building Enterprise Copilots Using Copilot Studio” (anyone reading, please don’t steal these titles lol). I don’t know which one I will start soon but both are my personal projects for the year 2026.
- I am currently working on submitting proposals to speak at a couple of really big conferences mainly about Docker and open source projects that I am involved in. I am also the technical committee chair for a couple of IEEE conferences. Hopefully I end 2026 on a big note.
- Cross country road trip to the best beaches in the west coast.
If you weren’t working in tech, what would you be doing instead?
I would have been a cricketer, maybe? My love of Cricket started when I was six years old which was an escape from home and it lasted till now. I still play in domestic leagues in Seattle. Even when I was working in China, I used to play for local clubs in Shanghai with people from different countries. I don’t know if I would have excelled in cricket in a parallel universe (I guess we would never know) but the love towards it is unconditional.
Below pic was right after a game we lost in semifinals of a local domestic league but we were still high on spirits for trying till the last minute (easy guess that blue is my fav color :P)
Can you share a memorable story from collaborating with the Docker community?
Docker community is one of the most active and vibrant communities, where we always encourage and cheer each other’s successes. I still remember the day when I was warmly welcomed into the Slack group as a new captain to get immediate help on a Friday evening when I was having some issues working with Docker Model Runner. My best memory was sitting in the hotel lounge with other Docker Captains at midnight in Turkiye after a boat party and talking about multiple topics from Docker to startups for 3-4 hours.
What’s your favorite Docker product or feature right now, and why?
My favorite one is Docker Agent framework. During the release of Docker Agent, I was playing with the first hands bit when shared in our Captain’s group. I immediately saw there is a potential to integrate with GitHub Models to avoid vendor lock-in when building AI agents. I spoke to the product team, helped them with what exactly GitHub Models about and how this could be integrated into the product as it also supports Open AI standards. It was a useful chat with Docker team lead (Djordje Lukic) and in a couple of hours we had a new release with the integration with GitHub Models.
I also wrote a blog post (https://www.docker.com/blog/configure-cagent-github-models/) on this integration and why everyone should give it a try without worrying about spending money on getting your API developer keys.
Can you walk us through a tricky technical challenge you solved recently?
When I was giving AI related workshops in some colleges from South India, they mentioned some of the popular Microsoft open source repositories not having support for local language translation. There are many colleges that still study in their mother tongue and that hit me hard, so I spent 3-4 weekends and worked on implementing it and currently we have all South Indian languages (Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Malyalam) support on all the Microsoft open source repositories (100K+ GitHub stars). Check out:
What’s one Docker tip you wish every developer knew?
With the current AI world we are living in, it’s super easy to generate Dockerfiles but VS Code extension (Docker DX- https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=docker.docker) makes it easy to live-debug to figure out any issues. This is a must have tool in your arsenal.
If you could containerize any non-technical object in real life, what would it be and why?
If I had powers I would containerize work sessions. Imagine a perfect containerized isolated work environment that would isolate you from distractions, whether you are at the office, home or on a cruise.
Where can people find you online?
I am always active on LinkedIn and sharing my knowledge on my blog.
Rapid Fire Questions
Cats or Dogs?
Dogs
Morning person or night owl?
Morning Person (4 am)
Favorite comfort food?
Hyderabadi Spicy Dum Biryani
One word friends would use to describe you?
Energetic
A hobby you picked up recently?
Learning Spanish on Duolingo
