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Quick Start: Your First Cloudspace & Virtual Machine

In this tutorial you will deploy your first virtual machine on Pilvio.pro and reach it from your own browser. By the end you will have a running Linux VM serving a page you can open at its public address. Expect to spend about 15 minutes.

This is the "hello world" of the platform: it walks through the three things every deployment needs — a network, a machine, and a way in — so the same pattern scales to real workloads later.

What you're going to build

You will create, in order:

  1. A cloudspace — a private virtual network your VM will live in.
  2. A virtual machine (VM) — a Linux server running inside that network.
  3. A way in — either a port forward, a single "door" from the public internet to a port on your VM, or a WireGuard VPN that joins your device to the cloudspace's private network.

Here is how the pieces fit together:

Location (data centre)
└── Cloudspace (your private network, has one external IP)
    └── Virtual Machine (your Linux server, private IP)
        ├── Option A, port forward:  <cloudspace external IP>:<port>  ->  VM:<port>
        └── Option B, WireGuard VPN: your device  ->  encrypted tunnel  ->  VM private IP

A VM is private by default — it has an internal IP and no way in from the internet. That is why the last setup step (the port forward or the VPN) is what makes it reachable. Keeping machines private until you open a specific door is intentional and secure.

Before you start

  • An active Pilvio.pro account. If you do not have one, see Create Your Account.
  • At least one location available to you. A location is the data centre where your resources run.

Step 1: Sign in

  1. Open your Pilvio.pro portal URL.
  2. Enter your email address and password, then click Login (SSO users use the relevant Sign in with ... button).
  3. Complete two-factor authentication if it is enabled for your account.

You land on the Welcome page, which lists the customer accounts available to you. Click your customer to enter its portal — the rest of this tutorial happens inside it.

Step 2: Create a cloudspace (your network)

Everything runs inside a cloudspace, so you make this first. It is an isolated virtual network with its own external IP.

  1. In the left menu, click Cloudspaces, then click [+ CREATE CLOUDSPACE].
  2. Select location — pick the location closest to your users. The list shows each location's unit prices. Click Next.
  3. Select type — choose To an external network (internet); the step title becomes Connect to an external network. Then:
  4. Pick the external network (one is preselected).
  5. Choose Using the built in virtual firewall (recommended) — it supports port forwards, reverse proxy, load balancing and connecting to remote cloudspaces.
  6. Click Next.
  7. Add configuration details:
  8. Name — a friendly name, e.g. my-first-cs.
  9. Subnet — leave the default (e.g. 192.168.0.0/24) unless you have specific networking needs.
  10. The domain fields are optional for this tutorial — leave them.
  11. Click Create Cloudspace.

Creation runs as a background task (watch the Create Cloudspace (…) progress toast); you are taken to the cloudspace details page when it finishes.

✔ You did it if: the cloudspace status is RUNNING and the Details panel shows a Default External IP. Write that IP down — you need it if you choose the port forward in Step 4.

Step 3: Create a virtual machine (your server)

Now put a Linux server inside that network.

  1. On your cloudspace details page, click [CREATE VM] in the action bar.
  2. Select virtual machine source — choose from an image, then Select image and pick a Linux image (e.g. Ubuntu Server 22.04). Images vary by location; selecting a row advances the wizard.
  3. Compute size — the defaults come from the image. For this tutorial: vCPUs 1–2, Memory 2048 MiB, and the default Boot disk size.
  4. Storage — pick the storage class for the disks. The class sets the performance tier and carries an SU multiplier that scales billing (above 1.0 costs more per GiB but gives the same capacity; the default class is 1.0). See Billing & Resource Units.
  5. User data — paste your SSH public key here so you can log in without a password later. (You can also attach a saved user data template or cloud-init config — see Configure Cloud-Init.)
  6. Configuration details — set a Name, e.g. my-first-vm. A Configuration cost widget shows the running estimate.
  7. Click CREATE.

The VM builds and starts automatically; its status goes DEPLOYING then RUNNING.

✔ You did it if: the VM status is RUNNING and the Details panel shows its IP address, Username and Initial password. Note the username — you will need it to log in.

Step 4: Choose how to reach the VM

Your VM is private: it has an internal IP and no way in from the internet. To reach it from your laptop you have two options. Pick one for this tutorial; you can set up the other later.

Port forward WireGuard VPN
What it does Opens one port of the cloudspace's external IP and maps it to a port on your VM Joins your device to the cloudspace's private network through an encrypted tunnel
You connect to <cloudspace external IP>:<port> The VM's private IP
Best for A quick start, or one service that should be reachable from the internet, such as a web server Private access to several VMs and ports that should not be public
Set-up One form A WireGuard interface in the cloudspace, a peer for your device, and the WireGuard app

Option A: Port forward

The quickest way. We forward SSH (port 22) so you can log in.

  1. Open your cloudspace, click MORE → Port forwards → CREATE PORT FORWARD.
  2. Fill in:
  3. From IP address — leave empty to use the cloudspace's external IP.
  4. External virtual firewall port — e.g. 22022.
  5. To → Virtual machine, select my-first-vm.
  6. VM port — 22.
  7. Protocol — TCP.
  8. Save.

Option B: WireGuard VPN

Nothing is opened to the internet: your device becomes part of the cloudspace's network. This is a short version, the full guide is WireGuard VPN.

  1. On the cloudspace details page, open the WIREGUARD VPNs tab and click Add WireGuard Interface. Click Suggest IP Network for the address, keep the default port (51820) and MTU (1420), choose Generate key pair automatically, enter a Name such as my-first-vpn, and click ADD.
  2. Open the interface and click Add Peer. Choose Generate key pair automatically, set the Allowed IPs (the guide explains them), enter a Name such as my-laptop, and click ADD. Then click Download config to get the .conf file.
  3. Import the .conf file on your device and activate the tunnel. On Windows and macOS use the WireGuard app: Import tunnel(s) from file, then Activate. On Linux, open Settings → Network, add a VPN, and choose Import from file....
  4. Check the tunnel by pinging the WireGuard interface address shown on the interface details page.

Step 5: Connect and see it work

This is the payoff. Log in to the VM with SSH, using the username shown on the VM details page. If you added an SSH key in Step 3 you log in with the key. Otherwise use the Initial password from the VM details page.

If you chose the port forward

ssh -p 22022 <username>@<cloudspace_external_ip>

Use the cloudspace external IP from Step 2.

If you chose the VPN

With the tunnel active, connect to the VM's private IP, the IP address on its details page:

ssh <username>@<vm_private_ip>

Prove it works

Once logged in, start a throwaway web server:

python3 -m http.server 80
  • Port forward: add a second port forward as in Step 4, with VM port 80 and External port 8080, and open http://<cloudspace_external_ip>:8080 in your browser.
  • VPN: no second forward is needed. Open http://<vm_private_ip> in your browser.

You should see the directory listing served by your VM. That is your workload running on Pilvio.pro. Press Ctrl+C in the SSH session to stop the web server.

Clean up

Resources are billed for as long as they exist, so delete what you made when you are done: delete the VM first, then the cloudspace (a cloudspace cannot be deleted while it still contains VMs).

What's next?