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Before you can use Ona, you need to connect your source control provider and start your first environment.

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Step 1: Sign in to Ona

  1. Navigate to app.ona.com
  2. Click Continue with SSO and enter your organization’s SSO credentials
If your organization is not on an Enterprise plan, you can also sign in with Continue with Google or Continue with GitHub. Enterprise users should always use SSO.
  1. Authorize Ona to access your repositories
You may be prompted to grant access to your approved source control provider (GitHub, GitLab, or Bitbucket) so you can work with your company’s code inside Ona Environments.

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Step 2: Choose a repository

For this workshop, you can use: If using your own repository, ensure it has a README.md or some code you can modify.

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Step 3: Create a project

A Project ties a repository to Ona and gives you a consistent place to manage environment settings, prebuilds, and shared secrets. Creating a project first means every environment you launch from it inherits the same configuration.
  1. Go to app.ona.com/projects
  2. Click New Project
  3. Select your repository (the one you chose in Step 2)
  4. Configure:
    • Default branch: usually main
    • Environment class: the compute resources for your environments (CPU, RAM)
Once created, your project appears in the dashboard. All environments launched from this project share the same settings.

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Step 4: Start an environment

From the projects list, find the project you just created. Hover over the project card and click Create environment, or click into the project and use the Create environment button in the top right. The environment starts immediately using the branch and settings configured in your project. Startup time varies depending on the environment class and the size of the repository, typically between 30 seconds and a few minutes on first launch.

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Step 5: Connect your IDE

When your environment starts, you’ll see options to connect:
Make sure you’re running the latest version of VS Code Desktop. Older versions may not support the Ona extension or remote environment features. Update via Code (macOS) | Help (Windows) > Check for Updates or download the latest release from code.visualstudio.com.
  1. Click Open in VS Code Desktop
  2. Install the Ona extension if prompted
  3. Your local VS Code connects to the remote environment
You’re now editing code that runs in the cloud, not on your machine.

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VS Code Browser

Click Open in Browser to use VS Code in your web browser. No installation required.

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Other editors

Ona supports Cursor, Windsurf, JetBrains IDEs, and Zed. See Editors & IDEs for setup instructions.

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Verify your setup

Once connected, open a terminal in your IDE and run: 
pwd
You should see a path like /workspace/your-repo. This is your environment: a Linux VM running in the cloud with your repository cloned and ready. Try creating a file: 
echo "Hello from Ona" > test.txt
cat test.txt
The file exists in your cloud environment, not on your local machine.

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What you’ve accomplished

You’ve:
  • Connected Ona to your source control
  • Created a project for your repository
  • Started a cloud development environment from that project
  • Connected your IDE to that environment
  • Verified you can run commands and create files
Next, you’ll learn what makes these environments powerful.
Next: Lab 1: Environments