diff --git a/scripts/hosting/digitalocean/cloud-config.yml b/scripts/hosting/digitalocean/cloud-config.yml
index 2042f1cb..de771526 100644
--- a/scripts/hosting/digitalocean/cloud-config.yml
+++ b/scripts/hosting/digitalocean/cloud-config.yml
@@ -1,5 +1,15 @@
 #!/bin/bash
 
+# get the kernel and initrd
+URL_BASE="https://releases.rancher.com/os/latest"
+VMLINUX="vmlinuz"
+INITRD="initrd"
+
+cd /tmp
+curl -O -L "${URL_BASE}/${VMLINUX}"
+curl -O -L "${URL_BASE}/${INITRD}"
+
+# setup the host ready for kexec
 PUBLIC_IPV4=$(wget -qO- http://169.254.169.254/metadata/v1/interfaces/public/0/ipv4/address)
 
 if [ "$(ros config get rancher.environment.installer)" == "true" ] && ros --version &>/dev/null; then
@@ -21,11 +31,6 @@ EOF
 	exit 0
 fi
 
-URL_BASE="https://releases.rancher.com/os/latest"
-cd /tmp
-curl -O -L "${URL_BASE}/vmlinuz"
-curl -O -L "${URL_BASE}/initrd"
-
 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
 apt-get update && apt-get install -y kexec-tools ipcalc
 
@@ -34,4 +39,4 @@ PUBLIC_IPV4_CIDR=$(ipcalc ${PUBLIC_IPV4}/${PUBLIC_IPV4_NETMASK} | awk '/^Network
 PUBLIC_IPV4_GATEWAY=$(curl -s http://169.254.169.254/metadata/v1/interfaces/public/0/ipv4/gateway)
 
 
-kexec --initrd=initrd -l vmlinuz -f --command-line="quiet rancher.network.interfaces.eth0.address=${PUBLIC_IPV4}/${PUBLIC_IPV4_CIDR} rancher.network.interfaces.eth0.gateway=${PUBLIC_IPV4_GATEWAY} rancher.network.interfaces.eth0.dhcp=false rancher.cloud_init.datasources=[digitalocean] rancher.environment.installer=true"
+kexec --initrd=${INITRD} -l ${VMLINUX} -f --command-line="quiet rancher.network.interfaces.eth0.address=${PUBLIC_IPV4}/${PUBLIC_IPV4_CIDR} rancher.network.interfaces.eth0.gateway=${PUBLIC_IPV4_GATEWAY} rancher.network.interfaces.eth0.dhcp=false rancher.cloud_init.datasources=[digitalocean] rancher.environment.installer=true"
diff --git a/scripts/hosting/digitalocean/host.sh b/scripts/hosting/digitalocean/host.sh
new file mode 100755
index 00000000..26234438
--- /dev/null
+++ b/scripts/hosting/digitalocean/host.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,40 @@
+#!/bin/bash
+
+#
+# This script will make a shell script that can be used as a cloud-init style user data script
+# or run as root from a debian/ubuntu DigitalOcean VM to replace that distribution with
+# RancherOS
+#
+# Its intended to be used for development, but can easily be modified to be more generally
+# useful - make a Pull Request :)
+# 
+# Note: this script will run caddy in your os/dist/artifacts/ directory, so don't leave it
+# running unsupervised.
+
+DIST="../../../dist/artifacts"
+command -v caddy >/dev/null 2>&1 || { echo >&2 "I require caddy but it's not installed, see https://github.com/mholt/caddy#quick-start . Aborting."; exit 1; }
+
+if [[ ! -e "$DIST" ]]; then
+	echo "Need to 'make release' so that there are files to serve. Aborting."
+	exit 1
+fi
+
+source ${DIST}/../../scripts/version
+VMLINUX=$(ls -1 ${DIST}/vmlinuz-* | head -n1)
+INITRD="${DIST}/initrd-${VERSION}"
+
+IP=$(curl ipinfo.io/ip)
+PORT=2115
+
+CLOUDCONFIG="digitalocean.sh"
+
+cat cloud-config.yml \
+	| sed "s|^URL_BASE.*$|URL_BASE=http://${IP}:${PORT}|g" \
+	| sed "s|^VMLINUX.*$|VMLINUX=${VMLINUX}|g" \
+	| sed "s|^INITRD.*$|INITRD=${INITRD}|g" \
+		> ${DIST}/${CLOUDCONFIG}
+
+echo "Hosting a cloud-config script at http://${IP}:${PORT}/${CLOUDCONFIG}"
+
+cd ${DIST}
+caddy -port ${PORT}