Can run ARM/rpi images in Docker on Windows but not linux

Docker for windows (and docker for mac) both use a linux vm to host containers. However, the difference between the linux vm they use and your linux machines is the fact that their VM has a kernel system called binfmt_misc setup to call qemu whenever it encounters a binary for a foreign architecture (https://github.com/linuxkit/linuxkit/blob/1c552f7a9db7f0660d3c83362d241e54142323ca/pkg/binfmt/etc/binfmt.d/00_linuxkit.conf )

If you were to configure your linux machine appropriately, it could be used as a build server for ARM images. Google qemu-user-static for some ideas of how to set it up.

Note that the linuxkit vm uses the 'F' flag which doesn't seem to be standard when configuring a typical linux environment. Without it, you need to put the qemu binary inside the container. I'm not sure why it isn't standard practice to use 'F' in more places (there does seem to be a debian bug to do so https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=868030 )

On Windows and Mac docker works under Linux VM. So, I think, that for your container under Windows started ARM Linux VM. But under native Linux used native architecture.

The "exec format error" confirms that you are not running your docker image on the correct architecture. I had this error trying to run a x86 docker image on a Raspberry Pi 2 (Which works with an ARM architecture). I am pretty sure it might be the same error when you do it the other way round.

So, as Kulti said, Windows/MAC must have started an ARM Linux VM.If you wish to work with ARM docker images on Linux, you may want to try running a linux docker VM manually. I think you can do it using "docker-machine" even on linux : Docker documentation for docker-machine. (Haven't done it myself so I am not sure)

Hope this helps.