diff --git a/modules/docker.py b/modules/docker.py
index 10ff6c2..9475da1 100644
--- a/modules/docker.py
+++ b/modules/docker.py
@@ -1,22 +1,28 @@
 from fabric.api import env, task
 
-from fabric.operations import run
-
 from fabric.contrib.files import upload_template
 
 from .utils import loggify, generate_template_files_path, booleanize
 from .utils import generate_template_build_path, print_console
+from .utils import executize
 
 
 @task
 def docker_ip():
     configuration = env.config
+    _execute = executize("run")
+
+    # in the configuration file under docker,database, if host is set to local
+    # use docker-machine, because it means we are probably on OSX
+    #
+    # otherwise, if host is set to anything else (like the actual ip) then just
+    # return the host ip address that we set in configuration
 
     if configuration.docker.database.host == 'local':
         docker_cmd = 'docker-machine ip %s' % \
             configuration.docker.machine
 
-        return run(docker_cmd)
+        return _execute(docker_cmd)
 
     else:
         return configuration.docker.database.host
@@ -26,15 +32,27 @@ def docker_run(cmd):
     from fabric.context_managers import prefix
     configuration = env.config
 
+    # use executize to return either the methods sudo or run from
+    # fabric.operations
+    #
+    # we are checking to see if the host is local or not
+    # if it is local, that means OSX, which means the user can directly run any
+    # docker commands, but if it is remote, it probably requires sudo to run
+    # docker commands
+
+    _execute = executize("run")
+    if configuration.docker.database.host != 'local':
+        _execute = executize("sudo")
+        
     if configuration.docker.machine:
         docker_eval = "eval $(docker-machine env %s)" % \
             configuration.docker.machine
 
         with prefix(docker_eval):
-            run(cmd)
+            _execute(cmd)
 
     else:
-        run(cmd)
+        _execute(cmd)
 
 
 @task
@@ -161,6 +179,7 @@ under "docker"
     if env.debug:
         logger.debug("build_path            : %s" % build_path)
         logger.debug("dockercompose_cmd     : %s" % dockercompose_cmd)
+
     else:
         docker_run(dockercompose_cmd)