[Bug]: make run: nc not found (Tips on Development setup in here)

[chrismahoney]

Is there an existing issue for the same bug? (If one exists, thumbs up or comment on the issue instead).

• [x] I have checked the existing issues.

Describe the bug and reproduction steps

This was same as report in stale issue #905: make run nc not found, just getting situated with Dev environment so I'll record the journey here in the hopes people find it.

Here's what I did:

• Installed all the reqs, I'm at python 3.12
• Clone openhands at main
• Reopen in VSCode devcontainer
• make build, completed OK
• make setup-config, added LLM details
• make run

Expected: Devcontainer setup instructions Just Work.

Observed: That never happens in real life 🤣

• On first make run: nc: not found. Ran apt install -y netcat (May need to be added as RUN in Dockerfile)
• On attempt to start-frontend: cross-env: not found. This led me to the frontend node app not being installed/built as cross-env is one of its dependencies.
  • Entered frontend, npm install, npm run build OK, retry start-frontend OK, frontend loads. Great! Need a backend.
• Ran start-backend: That worked fine, OK
• Back to project root and make run: That worked fine, OK
  • Advanced settings, added base URL, [provider]/[model] info, 'dummy' for API Key based on devstral docs
  • UI works

TODO:

• It looks like the only issue here is the missing container dependency for netcat, which can be installed in the container directly via apt install -y netcat. This would be added to the container definition for the devcontainer itself, if I have time to learn about if that's any different from Docker I may just make my first contribution.

Otherwise, hopefully this helps someone trying to get up and running with devcontainers. 🙌

OpenHands Installation

Development workflow

OpenHands Version

main

Operating System

MacOS

Logs, Errors, Screenshots, and Additional Context

No response

[chrismahoney]

Feel free to deprioritize this issue, just wanted to brain dump while it's fresh.

[llamantino]

Hi! This should be resolved by #8891. Also, make sure to run make build before make run when setting up the dev environment.

Edit: If you run into connection issues between the app and the runtime container, you might want to wait for #8971 to be merged, or apply the fix manually. You'll also have to rebuild the devcontainer after making the change.

[chrismahoney]

Cool, thanks for the update 🙌

[llamantino]

Hi again! Both PRs (#8891 and #8971) have now been merged - just checking in to see if everything's working fine on your end now. If so, let us know if the issue can be closed. Thanks!

[mamoodi]

Going to close this based on the PRs merged. Please let me know if these did not fix the issue.