
Show HN: Termbox – Launch a Linux terminal with two clicks - jgillich
https://termbox.io/
======
jgillich
Termbox is somewhat similar to the recently announced dply.co, but I think our
approach is much better for the following reasons:

* The interface is super streamlined. Open the page, confirm captcha, click launch - boom, you got a terminal. The planned SSH support will be similar to that - no web page, just do ssh root@ubuntu.termbox.io and you get logged in to a Ubuntu box.

* We use VM based containers (hypercontainer.io) and not full VMs, so startup is very fast and instances are super cheap. 2 hours of the 512MB DigitalOcean server cost $0.014, 2 hours of a 512MB Termbox instance currently cost us around $0.0001

* Because our instances are so cheap, we do not impose any limits on the amount of boxes you can create. Just leave them behind, they will be cleaned up automatically.

~~~
Matt3o12_
What is the difference begeeen docker, a traditional VM and hypercontainer?
And what are the trade off of hypercontainer?

~~~
jgillich
There's a comparison table here: [https://hypercontainer.io/why-
hyper.html](https://hypercontainer.io/why-hyper.html)

~~~
diggan
Makes for a suspicious comparison when both the two other options, have no
features that hyper doesn't or is better. I understand that this comparison
comes from you, and it's not easy being completely fair when doing a
comparison, but I can't find anywhere anything against using Hyper or even any
tradeoffs.

~~~
jgillich
I'm not involved with Hyper/HyperContainer, I'm just a user and recently
started contributing. I've had hyperd silently crashing once, and the API and
tooling is a bit rough, but these things can be fixed. No complaints so far
from a purely architectural viewpoint.

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jswrenn
FYI: This has a name clash with a fairly popular TUI library:
[https://github.com/nsf/termbox](https://github.com/nsf/termbox)

~~~
JayOtter
Which is a really good, actively maintained library. Shameless plug for the
game engine I wrote using it:
[https://github.com/JoelOtter/termloop](https://github.com/JoelOtter/termloop)

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beshrkayali
Captcha doesn't reset after first error message about server capacity, so when
you click launch again it says captcha is wrong.

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Hates_
Stupid question maybe, but what would the use case for something like this be?
Can I run a server on it?

~~~
jajern
I'm curious too. I can't think of any reason I would use this. Maybe to use
during an online course or something, but most of them offer a way to do that
already.

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zydeco
After getting an over capacity error, you always get a captcha verification
error and have to reload the page

~~~
m0shen
I also got this error:
[http://i.imgur.com/yIj1Zvm.png](http://i.imgur.com/yIj1Zvm.png)

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diggan
Slightly off-topic but kind of not. Through the website, I found
[https://hypercontainer.io/](https://hypercontainer.io/) which seems to fit
really good for a use-case of mine.

However, it's the first time I see HyperContainer. Anyone have anything
good/bad to say about it? The value proposition seems really attractive "Fast
as Container" \+ "Isolated by VM" but can't find anything about the tradeoffs
so would love someone who tried it to write about their experience.

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jgillich
The server has limited resources of 32GB RAM, so sorry if you're not getting
in. The good news is that you can install it on your own hardware, it's all
open source:
[https://github.com/termbox/termbox](https://github.com/termbox/termbox)

~~~
shakna
Does it really have to be 777?

    
    
        chmod 777 /var/run/hyper.sock

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jgillich
Probably not, but I haven't really bothered to look into that, it should
really be using HTTP instead.

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aub3bhat
I wonder if this can be used to hide malicious activity or even as a form of
honeypot. Its simple to create such service then post/advertise on reddit, and
simply monitor all commands the users execute. Soon you will have a trove of
all sort of malicious scripts used for crawling, automated purchasing,
phishing, spamming etc. You can also use the service yourself to get lost in
the crowd.

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Retr0spectrum
It was working for a bit, and then the terminal went blank with:

    
    
        lost server
    

Edit: a refresh fixed it, but I lost my current shell session

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nawtacawp
over capacity and I get a captcha error when trying to select a different
server. I have to reload the page -- never got to a terminal.

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equalunique
[ 0.182343] smpboot: CPU0: Intel(R) Atom(TM) CPU C2750 @ 2.40GHz (family: 0x6,
model: 0x4d, stepping: 0x8)

Neat to see one of these connected to the internet serving a production
service! I also have a C2750 system.

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mdrzn
This seems cool, but I don't know what to do with it, apart from sshing into
my own server if I'm on a PC that doesn't have a ssh client on it. Just
remember to use 2FA.

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coverband
It may be the HN effect, but after opening an Ubuntu session and a vi console,
it started refreshing constantly and telling me:

STATUS Reconnecting

Will need to try again when the traffic slows down...

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rocketpastsix
Seems to be no way to go back up the terminal, so if you run something like
grep --help, you only get the bottom portion of the help section rather then
the whole thing.

~~~
jgillich
It uses tmux for session management, so you can press Ctrl+b and [ to scroll
with the arrow keys and page up/down. But this is definitely something I will
try to fix soon.

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aroch
Probably want to disable the tmux keybinding for detach

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fil_a_del_fee_a
I actually like it. I think it is well implemented and can be used to play
around on command line with different flavors of linux. Well done!

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stonewhite
Considering the captcha it actually takes 3 clicks to launch

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koolba
> Considering the captcha it actually takes 3 clicks to launch

More like ten.

Six for the captcha choices, one to submit the captcha, one to pick the server
type, one to submit and get a " _Server capacity reached, please try again
later_ ", and finally one to close the browser tab.

~~~
jgillich
I'm not going to rent a $500 server just to handle the HN traffic spike,
sorry. Capacity will be expanded over time, but only after the service pays
for itself (either through ads or paid features).

~~~
koolba
No worries. I'm looking forward to trying it out again after things quiet down
a bit.

Fyi, it doesn't have to be a $500/mo server permanently either. Depending on
where your hosting the backend, you could scale it up temporarily and then
scale it back down when things quiet down. $500/mo is approx $16/day which
could be well worth it for a day while enjoying an HN-driven bump.

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daph
If you do

ctrl-b d

to disconnect from tmux, it pretty much leaves the server useless.

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moondev
over capacity. anyone have a screenshot for what the terminal looks like? Is
there a countdown timer?

~~~
jgillich
Welp, I've temporarily reduced the duration to 1h, should free up some slots.

Here's a screenshot:
[http://i.imgur.com/UsRgXhD.png](http://i.imgur.com/UsRgXhD.png)

~~~
mijoharas
After I got past the "over capacity" error I got to a screen like the above,
but without the terminal.

Javascript error:

    
    
        index.js:2371 Uncaught TypeError: this.base.append is not a function

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jgillich
Interesting, what browser and OS are you using?

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scbrg
Same here. Chromium: "Version 53.0.2785.143 built on Debian stretch/sid,
running on Debian stretch/sid (64-bit)"

~~~
jgillich
That's odd, probably a bug in preact but I can't reproduce it. I've deployed a
fix nonetheless.

~~~
mijoharas
index.js:2371 Uncaught TypeError: a.base.append is not a function

Still getting an error. As before, only header and footer visible.

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quiezio
do you plan to have an API to create boxes and to run some predefined scripts
on launch?

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fiatjaf
terminal.com all over again?

Great idea, closed in 6 months.

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bitwize
uhhhhhh

I can launch a Linux terminal with Super+Enter. (I run i3)

~~~
Skunkleton
did you even click the link?

