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Google cloud/app engine compute cloud shell - Free Debian NAT virtual machine for an hour
linuxthefish
Member
I noticed that when logged into https://console.cloud.google.com you can click the shell icon in the top right, and it opens a root (sudo) shell with access to a Debian 8 (3.16.0-0.bpo.4-amd64 kernel) virtual machine.
It gives you access to 5GB storage, and stays online unless you leave it idle for around an hour. It also gives you access to the compute engine tools and docker, so you don't have to setup the SDK thing on your own PC! I've used it for compiling stuff, transferring files between servers and as a web SSH client.
Anything outside of /home is reset when you open up a new session, so stuff you install with a package manager will be lost.
The major downside is that you can only access it from a web browser, port 25 is blocked and you get a NAT'd IP. Disk IO is also limited, but ioping reports 8us for / and 1ms for /home
They get very fussy if you use their network!
More info at https://cloud.google.com/cloud-shell/docs/
https://cloud.google.com/cloud-shell/docs/features
System Info
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Processor : Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU @ 2.50GHz
CPU Cores : 1
Frequency : 2500.000 MHz
Memory : 594 MB
Swap : 0 MB
Uptime : 1:46,
OS : Debian GNU/Linux 8
Arch : x86_64 (64 Bit)
Kernel : 3.16.0-0.bpo.4-amd64
Hostname : vm
Speedtest (IPv4 only)
---------------------
Your public IPv4 is 104.155.0.53
Location Provider Speed
CDN Cachefly 50.8MB/s
Atlanta, GA, US Coloat 16.0MB/s
Dallas, TX, US Softlayer 12.9MB/s
Seattle, WA, US Softlayer 10.1MB/s
San Jose, CA, US Softlayer 10.4MB/s
Washington, DC, US Softlayer 3.44MB/s
Tokyo, Japan Linode 8.18MB/s
Singapore Softlayer 5.14MB/s
Rotterdam, Netherlands id3.net 64.7MB/s
Haarlem, Netherlands Leaseweb 30.8MB/s
Disk Speed
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I/O (1st run) : 14.2 MB/s
I/O (2nd run) : 15.1 MB/s
I/O (3rd run) : 14.7 MB/s
Average I/O : 14.6667 MB/s
