Source Installation

Build Spinifex from source for development, custom builds, or contributing.

Overview
Instructions
Troubleshooting

Overview

This guide builds Spinifex from source. For production deployments, the binary installer is recommended.

Requirements:

Ubuntu 26.04 / Debian 13
Go 1.26.4+
GCC, make, pkg-config
QEMU/KVM, OVN/Open vSwitch, AWS CLI v2, dhcpcd-base

Instructions

Step 1. Install Dependencies

mkdir -p ~/Development/mulga && cd ~/Development/mulga
git clone https://github.com/mulgadc/spinifex.git
sudo make -C spinifex quickinstall
export PATH=$PATH:/usr/local/go/bin

Step 2. Clone and Build

cd spinifex
./scripts/clone-deps.sh

Step 3. Development Initialisation

./scripts/dev-install.sh

This bootstraps a single-node development environment: builds binaries, configures OVN, initialises the cluster, installs the CA certificate, and starts all services.

Step 4. Verify Installation

export AWS_PROFILE=spinifex
aws ec2 describe-instance-types

If this returns a list of available instance types, your installation is working.

Congratulations! Spinifex is installed from source.

Continue to Setting Up Your Cluster to import an AMI, create a VPC, and launch your first instance.

Troubleshooting

Go Not Found in PATH

export PATH=$PATH:/usr/local/go/bin

CA Certificate Not Trusted

sudo cp /etc/spinifex/ca.pem /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/spinifex-ca.crt
sudo update-ca-certificates

README.md