(1) Any data structure that holds one or more different types of data. See
metafile and
OLE.
(2) A server architecture that enables multiple applications and services to run in their own isolated partitions. Containers have less overhead than the common virtual machine infrastructure, and applications launch faster. See
Docker,
Kubernetes,
OS virtualization and
virtual machine.
(3) A multimedia file format that contains digital audio and video data streams that have been compressed with different algorithms (codecs). The container may also hold images, subtitles and other metadata. See
codec,
metadata,
Matroska,
MPEG,
AVI and
QuickTime.
(4) Software that acts as a parent program to hold and execute a set of commands or to run other software routines.