How do I open a terminal on my Odoo instance?

Need to run an Odoo shell, check which version of a dependency is actually installed, or look at what the filestore really holds? Hodiploy opens a terminal straight in your browser, on the instance of your choice, with no SSH key and no software to install.

Where it happens

1. Log in to Hodiploy from your Client Area
2. On the instance's row, open the "Actions" menu, then "Terminal"
3. The connection is made within seconds, and the terminal shows "Connected"

Where you actually are

You are inside this instance's Odoo container, as the odoo user, with its Python virtual environment already active. In practice:

• odoo-bin shell -d <database> gives you an Odoo shell, with the ORM at hand
• pip list tells you which Python libraries are really installed, and in which versions
• your modules, your configuration file and the attached files are where the instance reads them, not where you imagine them to be

That is what settles in thirty seconds the kind of question that otherwise costs a round of messages: is this module really loaded, is this dependency on the right version, did this file actually arrive.

You are not on the server hosting the instance, nor on our machines. The terminal is confined to the application container of that one instance: what you do there cannot reach another of your instances, nor anyone else's.

What to know before using it

The instance has to be running. On a stopped instance there is no container to enter, and the terminal says so immediately rather than leaving you waiting.

The session closes after 30 minutes without a keystroke. A tab forgotten at the end of the day leaves nothing running behind it.

There is no automatic reconnection, unlike the logs screen, and that is deliberate. Reconnecting on its own would give you a brand new shell: different working directory, lost variables, abandoned command, all of it under the previous lines still on screen, as if nothing had happened. Better to tell you the session has ended and let you open another with "Open a new session".

Two terminals at a time per account. If you ask for a third, close one of the other two first.

Closing the tab ends the session, and nothing lingers in the background on your server.

What stays outside the terminal

Some operations have their own screen in Hodiploy, and it is worth going through it: it knows how to warn your users, record the operation and roll it back cleanly.

• restarting or redeploying the instance: the dedicated button, not a hand-typed command
• backing up or restoring: the "Backups" screen
• changing resources or configuration: the "Edit" screen

The terminal is made to observe and diagnose. It can certainly be used to repair, but a lasting change made inside the container disappears at the next deployment, since that rebuilds the instance from your Git repository.

It is recorded

Every terminal opening is written to the instance's activity log, with the date and the person who clicked. On a production instance administered by several people, that is what lets you know who went in, and when.

A question?

If you're unsure which command to run, or if the terminal refuses to open while the instance is running, contact us and our team will look at it with you.

Updated on: 24/08/2026