Docker is a container technology that allows applications and their dependencies to be packaged into standardized units called containers that can run on any infrastructure regardless of environment. Key Docker tools include Docker Engine for running containers, Docker Machine for provisioning hosts, Docker Swarm for clustering hosts, Docker Compose for defining multi-container apps, and Docker Registry for storing images. Containers allow developers to focus on code by ensuring consistency across environments and enabling microservices architectures through modularization of applications into independent containers that can scale individually.