How labs work
A lab is a private Linux machine that runs for you in the cloud. You get root, a terminal, and VS Code in your browser. Three things are worth understanding before you start, because each one changes what you can do.
Your lab is a real machine
Install packages, run services, compile things, break it and rebuild it. Nothing is simulated.
Your home directory persists. Files you save there survive stopping, restarting and redeploying the lab. Everything outside your home directory is part of the lab image and resets when the lab is rebuilt — so install what you need through a startup script rather than by hand, and it will be there every time.
/home/<your-username> is the one place that is yours and permanent. Treat
everything else as disposable.
Your storage follows you, not the lab
You get one storage area per account, and it is mounted into every lab you run. A file you write in one lab is immediately there in all of them — no copying, no syncing.
The practical consequence: your storage quota is shared. Filling it up in one lab fills it up in all of them. See Storage for the limits and how to see what is using the space.
Labs are private until you publish them
By default a lab is reachable only by you, over a private tunnel.
Privately, you add a device once — a laptop, a phone, a server — and it can reach every lab you own: SSH, web apps, databases, anything listening. Nothing is exposed to the internet.
Publicly, you can choose to publish a lab by attaching a domain to it. The platform serves it over HTTPS and manages the certificate for you. This is opt-in per lab, and per port.
Where to go next
- Connect your device — set up the private tunnel
- Deploy your first lab — get something running
- Networking — domains, HTTPS and publishing ports