Development Environment

Visual Studio Code Remote Development allows contributors to use a consistent environment, access a development environment from multiple machines, and use runtimes not available on one’s local OS. Their remote development platform can be configured with the Nimbus Cluster and CloudLab for development environments.

Getting Started

  • Download Visual Studio Code

  • Download the Remote Development Extension Pack which includes the ‘Remote-SSH’, ‘Remote-WSL’, and ‘Remote-Containers’ extensions:

    • From Visual Studio Marketplace or

    • Launch VSCode

      • Click on the ‘Extensions’ icon on the left sidebar (Shift + Command + X)

      • Search ‘Remote Development’ and install the ‘Visual Studio Remote Development Extension Pack’

  • Reload VS Code after installation is complete

  • Setup and install OpenSSH on your local machine if one is not already present

  • Setup your work environment with CloudLab and/or the Nimbus Cluster

  • Setup Live Share so you can join and host real-time collaboration sessions

Setup OpenSSH

  • Install OpenSSH if not already present on your machine

  • Ensure that you have the .ssh directory in your user’s home directory:

1$ cd /Users/[Username]/.ssh

  • If the directory does not exist on your machine, create it with the following command:

1$ mkdir -p ~/.ssh && chmod 700 ~/.ssh

  • If the config file does not yet exist in your .ssh directory, create it using command:

1$ touch ~/.ssh/config

  • Ensure your config file has the correct permisisons using command:

1$ chmod 600 ~/.ssh/config

CloudLab Work Environment

  • Setup your SSH public key if you have not already done so

  • Login to your CloudLab account and select ‘Manage SSH Keys’ under your account profile and add your public key

  • When you instantiate a CloudLab experiment, a unique SSH command will be generated for you in the form: ssh -p portNum user@hostname listed under Experiment -> List View -> SSH Command

  • Ensure that your generated ssh command works by running it in terminal

  • Navigate to your system’s .ssh directory:

1$ cd /Users/[Username]/.ssh

and modify the config file to include (macOS or Linux) :

1Host hostname
2  HostName hostname
3  Port portNum
4  ForwardX11Trusted yes
5  User user_name
6  IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa
7  UseKeyChain yes
8  AddKeysToAgent yes

or (Windows) :

1Host hostname
2  HostName hostname
3  Port portNum
4  User user_name
5  IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa
6  AddKeysToAgent yes

  • Select ‘Remote-SSH: Connect to Host’ and enter ssh -p portNum user@hostname when prompted

  • VS Code will automatically connect and set itself up

  • After the connection is complete, you will be in an empty window and can then navigate to any folder or workspace using File -> Open or File -> WorkSpace

  • To initialize and run openNetVM, select File -> Open and navigate to /local/onvm/openNetVM/scripts

    • Select Terminal -> New Terminal and run:

1 $ source setup_cloudlab.sh
2 $ sudo ifconfig ethXXX down
3 $ ./setup_environment.sh

where ethXXX is the NIC(s) you would like to bind to DPDK

  • To disconnect from a remote host, select File -> Close Remote Connection or exit VS Code

Nimbus Cluster Work Environment

Nimbus VPN Method

  • In order to connect directly to your node in the Nimbus Cluster through VS Code, you must be connected to the Nimbus VPN

  • Navigate to your system’s .ssh directory:

1$ cd /Users/[Username]/.ssh

and modify the config file to include:

1Host nimbnodeX
2  Hostname nimbnodeX
3  Username user_name

where ‘X’ is the node assigned by a Nimbus Cluster system administrator

  • Launch VS Code and click on the green icon on the lower lefthand corner to open a remote window

  • Select ‘Remote-SSH: Connect to Host’ and enter user@nimbus.seas.gwu.edu when prompted

  • VSCode will automatically connect and set itself up - See Troubleshooting tips for connection issues and Fixing SSH file permissions for permissions errors

  • After the connection is complete, you will be in an empty window and can then navigate to any folder or workspace using File -> Open or File -> Workspace

  • To disconnect from a remote host, select File -> Close Remote Connection or exit VS Code

Alternative Method

You can also connect to the Nimbus Cluster through VS Code without using the Nimbus VPN. For instructions on how to configure this, see below.

If working with macOS or Linux:

  • Navigate to your system’s .ssh directory:

1$ cd /Users/[Username]/.ssh

and modify the config file to include:

1Host nimbnodeX
2  Username user_name
3  ProxyCommand ssh -q user_name@nimbus.seas.gwu.edu nc -q0 %h 22

where ‘X’ is the node assigned by a Nimbus Cluster system administrator

If working with Windows:

  • Navigate to your system’s .ssh directory:

1$ cd /Users/[Username]/.ssh

and modify the config file to include:

1Host nimbnodeX
2  Username user_name
3  ProxyCommand C:\Windows\System32\OpenSSH\ssh.exe -q user_name@nimbus.seas.gwu.edu nc -q0 %h 22

where ‘X’ is the node assigned by a Nimbus Cluster system administrator

Next: - Launch VS Code and click on the green icon on the lower lefthand corner to open a remote window - Select ‘Remote-SSH: Connect to Host’ and select the host you added, nimbnodeX, when prompted - VSCode will automatically connect and set itself up

  • After the connection is complete, you will be in an empty window and can then navigate to any folder or workspace using File -> Open or File -> Workspace

  • To disconnect from a remote host, select File -> Close Remote Connection or exit VS Code

cpplint Setup

  • Linting extensions run automatically when you save a file. Issues are shown as underlines in the code editor and in the Problems panel

  • Install cpplint:

    1$ sudo pip install cpplint

    • Windows:

1 $ pip install cpplint

  • Install the cpplint extension

    • From Visual Studio Marketplace or

    • Launch VSCode

      • Click on the ‘Extensions’ icon on the left sidebar (Shift + Command + X)

      • Search ‘cpplint’ and install

Live Share

Visual Studio Live Share allows developers to collaboratively edit in real-time through collaboration sessions.

  • Install the Live Share extension:

    • From Visual Studio Marketplace or

    • Launch VSCode

      • Click on the ‘Extensions’ icon on the left sidebar (Shift + Command + X)

      • Search ‘Live Share Extension Pack’ and install

  • Note: even if you already have the Live Share extension installed in your local VSCode application, you will have to reinstall it in your remote development environment in order to host collaboration sessions while you are connected to CloudLab or the Nimbus Cluster

  • Reload VSCode after installation is complete

  • Note: Linux users may need to follow extra installation steps to configure Live Share

  • In order to join or host collaboration sessions, you must sign into Visual Studio Live Share with a Microsoft or GitHub account

    • To sign in, click on the blue ‘Live Share’ status bar item on the bottom of the window or press Ctrl + Shift + P/ Cmd + Shift + P and select ‘Live Share: Sign in with Browser’ and proceed to sign in

  • To learn about more features that Live Share provides, see the User Guide

Collaboration Sessions

To edit and share your code with other collaborators in real-time, you can start or join a collaboration session

  • To start a session, launch VSCode and click the ‘Live Share’ status bar on the bottom of the window or press Ctrl + Shift + P/ Cmd + Shift + P and select ‘Live Share: Start a collaboration session (Share)’

    • A unique invitation link will automatically be copied to your clipboard which can be shared with others who wish to join your session

    • To access the invitation link again, click on the session state status bar icon and select ‘Invite Others (Copy Link)’

  • Once you start your session, a pop-up message will notify you that your link has been copied to your clipboard and will allow you to select ‘Make read-only’ if you wish to prevent guests from editing your files

  • If ‘read-only’ mode is not enabled, hosts and guests both have access to co-edit all files within the development environment as well as view each others edits in real-time

  • You will be notified as guests join your session via your invitation link which will also grant you the option to remove them from the session

  • To terminate your session, open the ‘Live Share’ custom tab and select ‘Stop collaboration session’

    • After the session has ended, guests will no longer have access to any content and all temp files will be cleaned up

Troubleshooting

On Windows, connecting GitHub to Visual Studio Code often has issues with GitHub Actions Permissions. VS Code often fails to request the “Workflow” permission, which is necessary for running the GitHub Actions we have on our repository. If you run into an error when pushing to a forked branch: [remote rejected] <branch name> -> <branch name> (refusing to allow an OAuth App to create or update workflow, it is likely because you don’t have the “Workflow” scope on the OAuth link you accepted to connect VS Code and GitHub.

To fix this, simply change the long OAuth link VS Code sends you to: scope=repo should be scope=repo,workflow. Once you update the link and load the page, you should be able to accept the updated permissions and push to GitHub.