John Morehouse gives us one way to restore a database in Docker:
Here are the steps that we will take to make this work:
1. Download one of the sample databases from I have a “mssql” directory in my local profile to make things easier
2. Make sure the container is started. You can issue a “docker ps” command terminal to see which containers are running
3. Create a directory within the container
4. Copy the sample database backup file into the directory you just created
5. Restore the database onto the SQL instance that is running within the container
The set of steps is fine and it’s what I normally do, though someone did suggest to set up an external volume linking, e.g., /var/opt/mssql/backups outside the container. That way, you can drop your backup file in and it’ll be there without the copy step.