Setting up the Development Environment
In this section we’ll go over the recommended steps for setting up a development environment for developing CloudShell Shells and orchestration scripts.
Install Python
Download and install a current 64-bit version of Python 3 from the official website. Shellfoundry, CloudShell's shell development CLI, supports Python 3.9–3.13 (Python 3.13 requires shellfoundry 1.2.29 or later).
Note that shells and scripts execute on the Python versions bundled with CloudShell itself, not on your dev machine's Python. As of CloudShell 2026.1 that is:
| Execution Server | Bundled Python 3 | Bundled Python 2 |
|---|---|---|
| Windows | 3.13.15 (64-bit) | 2.7.18 |
| Linux virtual appliance / from script | 3.9.9 | 2.7.18 |
| Docker Execution Server image | 3.9.9 | 2.7.18 |
Your driver code and its requirements.txt must stay compatible with the bundled version your CloudShell deployment runs. If your shells run on both Windows and Linux Execution Servers, they must work on both Python 3.9 and 3.13 — mind the standard-library removals in between, such as the collections aliases for the abstract base classes (collections.Sequence), which were removed in 3.10 in favor of collections.abc.
Earlier CloudShell versions bundle Python 3.9.9 on Windows as well; see Behavior Changes.
CloudShell components such as Quali Server and the execution servers come with their own Python installation folders. Making changes to these folders may cause unexpected behavior in CloudShell. Therefore, if you plan on doing dev work on a machine that has CloudShell components installed, we recommend doing one of the following:
- Configuring dedicated virtual environments for your projects out of these base installations. To do this in PyCharm, see https://www.jetbrains.com/help/pycharm/creating-virtual-environment.html. To do this via CLI, see https://docs.python-guide.org/dev/virtualenvs/#lower-level-virtualenv.
- Downloading separate installers for the bundled versions listed above and using these as global installations (by setting the installation folders in the machine’s PATH system variable) for any dev work being done.
Pick and install an IDE
In the scope of this guide we’ll discuss developing shells and scripts using standard Python, which means that there are many great options for an IDE. Some free IDEs to consider:
These are all great IDEs. At this point we recommend using PyCharm simply because you’ll be able to use Quali’s developer plugin developed for that IDE in the community. This plugin is not a must but will make your life a little easier by automating some steps required to upload your driver or set it up for debugging.
Install Git
Some CloudShell developer tools require Git to be installed.
Follow the installation instructions on the official website.
Install ShellFoundry (for Shells development)
To shorten the Shell development cycle and reduce much of the boilerplate of setting up new shell projects we recommend installing the Shellfoundry package. To install Shellfoundry, simply open a new command line window and type in the following:
python -m pip install shellfoundry
For additional information, see Shellfoundry.
(Optional) Install the CloudShell PyCharm plugin (PyCharm)
If you’ve selected to use PyCharm as your IDE, you can take advantage of the community contributed CloudShell plugin. Follow the installation instructions on the project repo. From the Step-by-step installation guide section perform steps 1-6 only. Don’t continue to configure the plugin usage further yet, we’ll get to that part later in this guide.
Where to next?
This guide contains three main areas depending on the type of development or integration you wish to do with CloudShell: