StreamingKV home RENTING

StreamingKV Free Edition -- running it on a rented RunPod machine

READ THIS FIRST

Read this whole page before you click the download link in your approval email: that link works only once, and the first thing below tells you how to use it. Allow about an hour the first time, most of it waiting for downloads. We walked these steps ourselves on a rented RTX 4090 in October 2026 (it cost us 22 cents); the screen labels come from RunPod as of then, so if one differs, look for the nearest label that means the same.

THE FOUR RULES

  1. SECURE CLOUD ONLY. RunPod rents two kinds of machine. Secure Cloud machines are run by RunPod in data centers. Community Cloud machines belong to private owners, who can read everything on them. Use Secure Cloud, never Community Cloud.
  2. THE SOURCE IS CONFIDENTIAL. The file you download contains the program's source code, and the license makes you responsible for it wherever you put it. It will sit on the rented machine's disk until you delete the machine, so delete it the same day you finish (step 15).
  3. DELETE, DO NOT STOP. RunPod bills by the second until you delete ("Terminate") the machine, whether or not you are using it. About $0.89 an hour is about $21 a day for a machine nobody is using. "Stop" is not the same as Terminate.
  4. STAY IN THE UNITED STATES. The license is for a person in the US; choose a US location for the machine too.

WHAT THIS GUIDE DOES, AND HOW TO TYPE THE COMMANDS

Everything happens in your web browser: you make a RunPod account, rent a machine with a suitable graphics card by the hour, open a terminal on it in a browser tab, put the program there, set it up and run it, and delete the machine at the end. Nothing is installed on your own computer, and you need nothing but a web browser.

A TERMINAL is a window where you type a command and press Enter, and the machine prints its answer below it. Where this guide shows a line indented on its own, type it exactly as shown, then press Enter. Capital letters and spaces matter. Nothing happens until you press Enter. A command has finished when the line ending in # comes back. You can also paste a line instead of typing it (see step 11); if pasting does not work, type it.

BEFORE YOU START: DOWNLOAD YOUR COPY

Look for an email from StreamingKV <downloads@streamingkv.com> with the subject "Your StreamingKV Free Edition download link" (check your spam folder if it is not there). Open the link in it, read the license, and type ACCEPT in the box on that page. (The program asks you to type ACCEPT once more later, on the rented machine. That is expected.)

Your browser saves a file whose name starts with streamingkv-free- and ends with .tar.gz (about 1.3 MB), usually in your Downloads folder (most browsers list recent downloads with Ctrl+J on Windows, or Cmd+Option+L on a Mac). Do not open or double-click it: you will upload this one file, unopened, in step 10. Do not open the email link again; it works only once. If the download failed or the file is lost, reply to the approval email and ask for a new link.

MAKE THE ACCOUNT AND ADD MONEY (once)

  1. Go to runpod.io and sign up (with an email address, or a Google or GitHub account). Confirm the email if asked. After signing in you are in RunPod's console: its pages are listed in the menu down the left side of the screen.
  2. Click Billing in that menu and add credit with a card. $25 is plenty. RunPod is prepaid: it cannot charge more than the credit you add.

RENT THE MACHINE (RunPod calls it a Pod)

  1. While signed in to RunPod, open this link in the same browser:

    https://console.runpod.io/deploy?template=fprpz7wdko

    It opens RunPod's page for renting a machine (a Pod), with the right software already chosen: the template named

    CUDA 12.8.1 . Ubuntu 24.04 . 1.4.0

    Check that this is the name shown. (If the link does not open it, use Pods -> Deploy in the left menu, and among RunPod's own templates pick the one with that name.)

  2. Among the filters for the list of graphics cards there is one for the kind of cloud. It should already be on SECURE CLOUD; leave it there (rule 1). If you ever see a warning about Community Cloud, you have picked the wrong kind: do not go on, set the filter back to Secure Cloud.
  3. Pick a graphics card: RTX 4090 (about $0.89 an hour; the one we tested). RTX A5000, L4 and RTX A6000 should also work. Each choice shows the card's memory (VRAM: 24 GB or more is right) and the machine's memory (RAM: skip anything under 24 GB). If there is a region choice, choose a US one.

  4. Two settings to change:

    • Click Set overrides, find Environment Variables and add one: in the key (name) box type JUPYTER_PASSWORD, and in the value box a password you make up, 16 or more letters and digits, no spaces. Write the password down; you need it in step 9. Anyone who has the machine's address and this password can use the machine, so make it a real one. Port 8888 is already listed; leave it.
    • In the Storage section, below the graphics cards, set the Container disk to 150 GB. Do not add a volume of any kind ("nothing attached" is right). A message that nothing is mounted (at /workspace) is expected and harmless: that is the optional volume you did not add.

    Leave everything else as it is. You do not need an SSH key: if RunPod mentions one anywhere, ignore it; this guide never uses SSH.

  5. If there is a choice of On-Demand or Spot (or Interruptible), choose On-Demand: the others can be taken away from you mid-run. Then click Deploy Pod. BILLING STARTS NOW, by the second, until you delete the Pod in step 15.
  6. The Pod appears on the Pods page. Wait until it shows as Running, then wait ONE MORE MINUTE: the machine says Running about a minute before it is ready for you.

LOG IN (a terminal in your browser)

  1. Once the Pod shows as running, its panel shows, under HTTP services, a line "Port 8888 -> JupyterLab" with "Ready" at its right: click JupyterLab. (If it does not say Ready yet, wait a minute.) Ignore the rest of the panel: the blue "SSH key not configured" box, "Enable web terminal" and "Direct TCP ports" are not needed. Do not press the red Stop button at the top (rule 3).

    A new browser tab opens (if nothing opens, your browser may have blocked it; allow pop-ups for runpod.io). A blank page or "404" means it is not ready yet: wait a minute and click JupyterLab again. Usually it opens straight into Jupyter Lab (RunPod's link signs you in). If instead a page asks for a "Password or token", type the password from step 6 in that box and ignore the text about tokens.

  2. Put your copy on the machine. Jupyter Lab opens with a file list on the left, showing the folder "/ workspace /" (empty at first), and a Launcher on the right. Do not open any other folder. Above the file list is a row of small buttons: a blue +, a folder, an arrow pointing up, and more. Click the arrow pointing up (Upload) and choose the streamingkv-free-...tar.gz file from your Downloads folder. It appears in the list. Upload it only once.

  3. Open a terminal: in the Launcher on the right, under Other, click Terminal (the tile with "$_" on it). If the Launcher is not showing, click File in the menu at the top, then New, then Terminal. A panel opens with a line like

    root@19b2a82be80d:/#

    (the letters and digits differ) and a blinking cursor. That is the rented machine, waiting for a command. You are logged in. A line saying "groups: cannot find name for group ID ..." may appear first; it is harmless.

    To paste a command, Ctrl+V (Cmd+V on a Mac); the browser may ask your permission the first time. To copy text out of the terminal, select it with the mouse, then right-click the selection and choose Copy. Do NOT press Ctrl+C in the terminal: there it stops whatever is running.

SET UP AND RUN (type each line, then press Enter)

  1. First, make the session survive a closed browser tab:

    tmux new -s stkv

    The panel clears and a green bar appears at the bottom: that bar is how you know it is working. If the browser tab ever closes, open Jupyter Lab and a terminal again (steps 9 and 11) and type

    tmux attach -t stkv

    to get everything back, still running. (If tmux new says "duplicate session", type that attach line instead.)

  2. Unpack the program and set it up. This is one command written over four lines: copy all four lines from this page, paste them into the terminal in one go (step 11), and press Enter. (If you type them instead, type each line including the \ at its end, and press Enter only after the last.) It updates the machine's list of software, moves your upload from the workspace folder, unpacks it, and starts the setup; if any part fails, it stops there and says why.

    apt-get update && apt-get install -y sudo && \
  mv /workspace/streamingkv-free-*.tar.gz /root/ && cd /root && \
  tar xzf streamingkv-free-*.tar.gz && cd streamingkv-free-*/ && \
  bash build/setup.sh

    setup.sh asks four questions. Answer exactly:

    the license summary ......... type ACCEPT, then Enter
the model's license ......... type the word yes, then Enter
                              (Enter alone or y stops setup)
Proceed with the INSTALL steps? ... press Enter
Run the check now? .......... press Enter

    It may say sudo "asks for your password"; on RunPod it does not. Then it installs what is missing, downloads the 22 GB model (about 5 minutes), builds the program, and runs the check: six questions whose answers it knows. It should end with 6 of 6 correct. In all, about 10 minutes. If setup stops, type bash build/setup.sh again; it picks up where it left off. If it stops with a message you do not understand, copy the message (step 11) and report it (IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG, below).

  3. When setup has finished, everything else is on one menu:

    bash build/start.sh

    It shows numbered choices and asks "Choose": type a number and press Enter; 0 quits. The program's own guide is in the Jupyter Lab file list: open root, then streamingkv-free-1.0.0, then docs, then README.md.

DELETE THE MACHINE WHEN YOU ARE DONE (the same day)

  1. First copy anything you want to keep: select text in the terminal and copy it (right-click, Copy), or right-click a file in the Jupyter Lab file list and choose Download. Then, back in the RunPod console, open the Pod (Pods in the left menu, then click it). Deleting it takes two steps, because RunPod offers Terminate only once the Pod is stopped:

    a. Click the red Stop button at the top of the Pod's panel (or the three dots, then Stop Pod). A box "Stop Pod" warns "ALL DATA will be lost"; that is expected. Click Stop Pod in it.

    b. Wait until the Pod shows as stopped (up to a minute). A Terminate button now appears. Click it. A box "Terminate Pod" says the deletion is irreversible; click Terminate Pod in it.

    Then check that the Pods page lists nothing. Stopping alone is NOT enough: the Pod stays on your list until it is terminated. Terminating removes it and its disk (and the source on it) for good.

IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG

Note which step you were on and what the screen said (copy it if you can), and report it on the problem-report form:

https://forms.fillout.com/t/iEfMtXYogaus

If the machine is still running and you are stuck, Terminate it (step 15) so it stops billing; you can rent a new one later and start again from step 3.

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