GUIdock

GUIdock-VNC is a container tool that uses a graphical desktop sharing system to provide a browser-based interface for containerized software. It enables the use of Docker for bioinformatics pipelines consisting of components that require a graphical user interface. The tool uses Virtual Network Computing (VNC) protocol to render graphics within commonly used browsers, and a minimal image builder to add the graphical desktop sharing system to any Docker packages. GUIdock-VNC can also use Oauth2 authentication protocols when deployed on the cloud. A proof-of-concept was demonstrated in gene network inference, and benchmarking showed minimal overhead on various operating systems.