Hackathon VM - Quick Start

What You Need

You should have these files on your D: drive (thaw drive):

hackathon-vm.ova — the VM image (~300 MB)
start-opencode.bat — the launcher script

If you don't have them, ask a mentor for the USB drive.

Setup (One Time)

1 Copy files to your D: drive

Create a folder D:\hackathon and copy both files into it.

2 Double-click `start-opencode.bat`

A terminal window opens. On first run it imports the VM (takes ~1 minute). After that, it starts in seconds.

3 Enter the password when prompted

hackathon

(you won't see characters as you type — that's normal)

4 Start coding!

OpenCode launches automatically. You're connected to the local AI GPU cluster.

That's it! You're ready to code with AI. Try a prompt like: "Create a Python Flask app with a /hello endpoint"

Daily Use

After a computer restart, just double-click start-opencode.bat again. Your project files inside the VM are preserved on the D: drive.

Useful commands inside the VM:

opencode — Start/restart the AI coding assistant
cd ~/projects — Go to your projects folder
git init my-app && cd my-app — Start a new project
sudo apk add <package> — Install additional packages
exit — Disconnect from the VM

Troubleshooting

"VirtualBox is not installed"

Ask a mentor to install VirtualBox on your machine, or check if it's already installed but not in your PATH.

"SSH client not found"

Go to Settings > Apps > Optional Features > Add > search "OpenSSH Client" > Install.

VM won't start / "locked" error

Close VirtualBox Manager if it's open, then try the script again. If that doesn't work, delete the D:\hackathon\VMs folder and run the script to re-import.

Connection refused / timeout

Wait 30 seconds and try again. The VM may still be booting. If it persists, check that port 2222 isn't used by another program.

OpenCode can't reach the AI

Make sure you're on the event network. Test from inside the VM:

curl -s http://ai.fhsucyber.com:40114/internal/health

If this fails, ask a mentor to check the GPU cluster status.

Still stuck? Ask a mentor — we're here to help!

Hackathon VM Quick Start