Depending on your religious beliefs, you may favor the Oracle JDK or the OpenJDK version, so in a gesture toward pan-ecclesiastical harmony, there are docker scripts for both OpenJDK and ther Oracle JDK.
Make a copy of your favorite and name it Dockerfile, then run the build script:
cp Dockerfile.OpenJDK Dockerfile
./build
NOTE: Oracle wants you to agree to their license terms here for the JDK and the Java Cryptography Extension (JCE) Unlimited Strength Jurisdiction Policy Files 8 found on these two pages:
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/jdk8-downloads-2133151.html
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/jce8-download-2133166.html
so go do that before you even think of building the OracleSDK version.
0.) run an instance
./run
1.) find the id for the docker instance
$ sudo docker ps
CONTAINER ID IMAGE COMMAND CREATED STATUS PORTS NAMES
c6bb80bf3ce2 shibboleth-idp "/usr/sbin/init" About a minute ago Up About a minute 80/tcp, 443/tcp, 8443/tcp, 0.0.0.0:8080->8080/tcp tiny_ramanujan
2.) use the docker exec command to start a bash shell and then use curl to ask for status:
$ sudo docker exec -it c6bb80bf3ce2 bash
[root@c6bb80bf3ce2 /]# curl http://localhost:8080/idp/status
### Operating Environment Information
operating_system: Linux
operating_system_version: 3.13.0-85-generic
operating_system_architecture: amd64
jdk_version: 1.8.0_77
available_cores: 4
used_memory: 1056 MB
maximum_memory: 3566 MB
### Identity Provider Information
idp_version: 3.2.1
start_time: 2016-04-07T21:54:16Z
current_time: 2016-04-07T21:55:21Z
uptime: 64967 ms
service: shibboleth.LoggingService
last successful reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:57Z
last reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:57Z
service: shibboleth.ReloadableAccessControlService
last successful reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:59Z
last reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:59Z
service: shibboleth.MetadataResolverService
last successful reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:59Z
last reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:59Z
metadata source: ShibbolethMetadata
service: shibboleth.RelyingPartyResolverService
last successful reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:58Z
last reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:58Z
service: shibboleth.NameIdentifierGenerationService
last successful reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:58Z
last reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:58Z
service: shibboleth.AttributeResolverService
last successful reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:58Z
last reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:58Z
DataConnector staticAttributes: has never failed
service: shibboleth.AttributeFilterService
last successful reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:58Z
last reload attempt: 2016-04-07T21:53:58Z
[root@c6bb80bf3ce2 /]#