Quick Start¶

Go from signup to a running server with SSH access — and see it appear in billing — in about 15 minutes.

What you'll build: one compute instance, SSH-accessible, attached to your first project.

Step 1 — Create an account¶

Open app.bnerd.cloud and complete the signup form, or use the API:

curl -X POST https://api.bnerd.cloud/create-account \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "login": "you@example.com",
    "name": "Your Name",
    "password": "a-strong-password",
    "password-confirm": "a-strong-password",
    "organization_name": "My Org"
  }'

Check your email and click the verification link before proceeding.

Step 2 — Authenticate and get a token¶

Via the dashboard¶

Log in at app.bnerd.cloud. For automation you will want a long-lived static token — self-service token management is currently in development (roadmap #20). Contact hello@bnerd.com if you need a static token before it ships.

Via the CLI (recommended for the terminal workflow)¶

bnerd login

The interactive prompt asks for your API URL, credentials, and organization, then writes ~/.bnerd.yaml (mode 0600). Verify it works:

bnerd whoami

Via the API directly¶

curl -si -X POST https://api.bnerd.cloud/login \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"login": "you@example.com", "password": "a-strong-password"}' \
  | grep -i '^authorization:'

TOKEN="<the JWT from the header>"

JWTs expire. For scripts and CI/CD use a static token (see Authentication).

Step 3 — Create a project¶

Projects group resources within your organization. Create one for this quickstart:

DashboardCLIAPI

Go to Projects → New Project, enter a name, and click Create.

bnerd projects create quickstart-project

The CLI prints the new project ID. Set it as the default for subsequent commands:

bnerd config set project-id <project-uuid>

ORG_ID="<your-org-id>"

curl -X POST https://api.bnerd.cloud/organizations/$ORG_ID/projects \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"project": {"name": "quickstart-project"}}'

Save the returned id as PROJECT_ID.

Step 4 — Upload an SSH key¶

You'll need an SSH public key to log in to the server.

DashboardCLIAPI

Go to SSH Keys → Add Key, paste your public key, and save.

bnerd ssh-keypairs create my-key --public-key "$(cat ~/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub)"

curl -X POST "https://api.bnerd.cloud/cloud/ssh-keypairs?project_id=$PROJECT_ID" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d "{\"name\": \"my-key\", \"public_key\": \"$(cat ~/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub)\"}"

Step 5 — Launch a server¶

DashboardCLIAPI

Go to Servers → New Server. Pick a flavor, image (e.g. Ubuntu 24.04), your keypair, and click Create. The server detail page shows the build progress.

Look up available images and flavors first:

bnerd images list
bnerd flavors list

Then create the server:

bnerd servers create web-01 \
  --flavor s.2 \
  --image ubuntu-24.04 \
  --key-name my-key

The CLI returns 202 Accepted. Poll until ACTIVE:

bnerd servers get <server-id>

# Get image and flavor IDs
curl "https://api.bnerd.cloud/cloud/images?project_id=$PROJECT_ID" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN"

curl "https://api.bnerd.cloud/cloud/flavors?project_id=$PROJECT_ID" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN"

# Create the server
curl -X POST "https://api.bnerd.cloud/cloud/servers?project_id=$PROJECT_ID" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "project_id": "'"$PROJECT_ID"'",
    "name": "web-01",
    "flavor_id": "<flavor-id>",
    "image_id": "<image-uuid>",
    "key_name": "my-key"
  }'

Returns 202 Accepted. Poll GET /cloud/servers/<id>?project_id=... until status is ACTIVE.

Step 6 — Get the IP address and SSH in¶

DashboardCLIAPI

On the server detail page, copy the IP address from the Addresses section.

bnerd servers get <server-id>

Look for addresses in the output.

curl "https://api.bnerd.cloud/cloud/servers/$SERVER_ID?project_id=$PROJECT_ID" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN"

The addresses field maps network names to IP addresses.

SSH in using the key you uploaded:

ssh -i ~/.ssh/id_ed25519 ubuntu@<server-ip>

Default user varies by image

Ubuntu images use ubuntu, Debian uses debian, Rocky Linux uses rocky. Check the image description if you're unsure.

Step 7 — See it in billing¶

The server starts accruing usage the moment it moves to ACTIVE. To verify it appears in your billing overview:

DashboardCLI

Go to Billing → Usage — the server appears under the current billing period.

bnerd billing overview

Clean up¶

To avoid ongoing charges, delete the server when you're done with it:

DashboardCLIAPI

On the server detail page, click Delete Server and confirm.

bnerd servers delete <server-id>

curl -X DELETE "https://api.bnerd.cloud/cloud/servers/$SERVER_ID?project_id=$PROJECT_ID" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN"

Troubleshooting¶

Symptom	Likely cause	Fix
Server stuck in `BUILD` > 10 min	Scheduler issue or image pull delay	Check `task_state` in the server detail; if `error` appears, delete and retry
SSH connection refused	Server still booting, or wrong IP	Wait for `status: ACTIVE` and `task_state: null`; verify you're using the correct address
SSH permission denied	Wrong key or wrong user	Confirm the keypair name was set at creation; check the default username for the image
`403 Forbidden` on API calls	Token lacks `openstack` permissions	Check your membership permissions at Settings → Members

Next steps¶

I want to…	Go to
Understand organizations and roles	Concepts
Control inbound traffic with a firewall	Per-instance firewalling
Provision object storage	Provision S3 Storage
Manage DNS for my domain	Manage DNS
Manage everything as code	Infrastructure as Code with Terraform
Browse all API endpoints	API Reference