SmolVM VSCode

A VS Code extension to manage SmolVM microVM sandboxes from within the editor, powered by the smolvm-sdk Node JS SDK.

Features

• SmolVM activity-bar view listing your machines and their status. The list is populated from smolvm machine ls --json at startup and refreshed periodically (and after each action).
• Create, start, stop, and delete machines from the view title bar and inline actions — all backed by the smolmachines SDK.
• Open Shell: drop into a running machine in a dedicated VS Code terminal.
• The machine registry (names + last-known status) is persisted in workspace state; machines are created persistent so they can be reconnected after a reload.

About the shell

The SDK exposes exec/execStream, not an interactive PTY, so Open Shell opens a normal VS Code terminal and runs the smolvm CLI:

smolvm machine exec --name <name> -it -- /bin/sh

The CLI's -it provides a real interactive PTY (so vim, top, etc. work). Configure the CLI binary with smolvm.cliPath (default smolvm) and the in-VM shell with smolvm.shell (default /bin/sh). The machine is started via the SDK first if it isn't already running.

Requirements

The smolvm CLI must be installed and on your PATH (or pointed at via the smolvm.cliPath setting). The extension shells out to it for every action — listing, creating, starting, stopping, deleting, and exec/shell — so nothing works without it. See smolmachines.com for install instructions.

Configuration

Creating a machine walks you through its configuration (image, resources, and the folder to bind). Number/image fields are pre-filled with the defaults below — press Enter to accept, edit to override, or blank to fall back. For the mount you choose Workspace root, Choose folder… (a folder picker over the filesystem), or Don't mount; by default the workspace root is bind-mounted (read-write) at /workspace.

All settings below map to the SDK's MachineConfig. Optional ones (null/empty) are omitted so the SDK applies its own defaults.

Project layout