Recently, while trying to use my docker desktop to run a few of my containers; I got an unexpected error: Cannot start Docker Compose application. Reason: fork/exec [docker-app-path]/bin/docker-compose-v1: permission denied. Here is the snippet of the error I got:
Cannot start Docker Compose application. Reason: fork/exec [docker-app-path]/bin/docker-compose-v1: permission denied
I would like to share the steps that helped me to fix the Cannot start Docker Compose application. Reason: fork/exec [docker-app-path]/bin/docker-compose-v1: permission denied error.
Why the Cannot start Docker Compose application. Reason fork/exec [docker-app-path]/bin/docker-compose-v1 permission denied Error is Seen?
Cannot start Docker Compose application. Reason: fork/exec [docker-app-path]/bin/docker-compose-v1: permission denied error is seen because of the latest update of Docker Desktop.
The Docker version 4.10.1 (82475) seems to have an incompatibility issues with the new Mac with M1. This may also be a permission issue in your docker-compose file, and not the Dockerfile of the application.
A detailed solution to understand the Cannot start Docker Compose application. Reason: fork/exec [docker-app-path]/bin/docker-compose-v1: permission denied error is provided below:
How to fix the Cannot start Docker Compose application. Reason: fork/exec [docker-app-path]/bin/docker-compose-v1 permission denied error ?
A simple and optimal solution is to downgrade your docker desktop version. You can downgrade the desktop version to Docker Desktop 4.9.1.
To fix the Cannot start Docker Compose application. Reason: fork/exec [docker-app-path]/bin/docker-compose-v1: permission denied; you will have to follow the below-mentioned steps to fix the error:
Step 1: You will have to downgrade your docker desktop version. You can downgrade the desktop version to Docker Desktop 4.9.1. You can check the documents from the docker’s original website with the link here.
Now you can run your containers from your terminal:
docker-compose up
This may also be a permission issue in your docker-compose file, and not the Dockerfile of the application. Try following the below steps to avoid the problem
Type the following command : which docker-compose
and this will prompt you the path of your docker-compose. You will have to replace chmod +rwx /usr/local/bin/docker-compose
with /usr/local/bin/docker-compose with your docker-compose path
Details about recently released Docker Desktop 4.10.0 features are mentioned on official site are below:



This should fix the error Cannot start Docker Compose application. Reason: fork/exec [docker-app-path]/bin/docker-compose-v1: permission denied.
Conclusion
To fix the Cannot start Docker Compose application. Reason: fork/exec [docker-app-path]/bin/docker-compose-v1: permission deniederror; you would have to downgrade your docker desktop version.
You can downgrade the desktop version to Docker Desktop 4.9.1. Now you will be able to run your containers from your terminal. This may also be a permission issue in your docker-compose file, not the application’s Dockerfile. You will have to change some permissions to avoid the error