Quadlet are mostly for deployment I would say, if you are looking for an alternative to compose, probably take a look at Podman Kube Play[1].
This is a similar format that Kubernetes with some nice addition (being able to build container for example).
The kube play can be at the root of your project, you can run `podman kube play project.yaml --build` and there it is! You pods, volume etc. running together.
The Quadlet file can be useful as deployment step, you want to publish your project on a VPS? Use a Kube Quadlet[2] in addition with the `project.yaml` you have!
I am part of the Podman Desktop[1] team, and I am personally a big fan of Podman Quadlets!
Recently I took the journey to deep dive into Quadlets, and see how it can be integrated into Podman Desktop. With the extension system we have (very similar to VS-Code), I created an extension called `Podman Quadlets` and wrote a blog on our website[2].
It integrate with Podlet[3] (but I am trying to move away from it, as I am not able to contact the author to address some issues, especially on Windows[4])
With this extension, you can list, generate, remove, edit, access journalctl logs of Quadlets from Podman Desktop. I will continue to work on it, improving it, and adding new features, so if you have some feedback don't hesitate! Suggestion, bug report, all are welcome[5]
You can check it out on the extension repository[6] or, if you have Podman Desktop installed, you can found it in `Extensions > Catalog > Podman Quadlet`
If you are curious to learn some basics about Podman Quadlets, I made a talk at FOSDEM 2025 on the topic[7]
1. enable remote connection in podman desktop (https://podman-desktop.io/docs/podman/podman-remote)
2. try the quadlet extensions (https://podman-desktop.io/blog/podman-quadlet)
I am curious to have feedback if you give it a try (https://github.com/podman-desktop/extension-podman-quadlet/i...)