Visual Studio Code is an IDE with full support for remote code development.

Modules

Users install and run VS Code on their own machine. On the remote side no module needs to be loaded - the client installs its own server automatically (~/.vscode-server).

Setup a remote connection

1) locally install the following VScode extensions

2) pick and fire up your remote compute node (avoid expansive tasks on logins), for example

salloc -p cpu-clx

3) add this block to your local SSH config to connect to any bcn* compute node via blogin

~/.ssh/config

Host clx-login
    User <your_username>
    HostName blogin.nhr.zib.de
    IdentityFile ~/.ssh/<your_key>

Host bcn*
    User <your_username>
    IdentityFile ~/.ssh/<your_key>
	ProxyCommand ssh -W %h:%p clx-login

4) in VScode open the Command Palette, type/enter: Remote – SSH: Connect to Host, and provide the specific name of your allocated compute node, e.g. bcn####

5) as soon as the remote connection in VScode is established you can install additional extensions on the remote side, too. Some recommendations are

GitHub Copilot
Python
JupyterHub
C/C++
Modern Fortran

Steps 2) and 4) need to be executed each time running VScode on a compute node. All other steps are required one time only - are permanent.

Optional: containerized VScode server

Advantage: inside container user has more rights, e.g., can use dnf.