How to know if a machine is an Google Compute Engine instance

Question

Is there a way to know from a command line shell if I am currently on a Google Compute Engine machine or somewhere else (development machine)?

Answer 1

You can also use the dmidecode utility to probe the virtual hardware if you don't want to make a network call:

my@myinst:~$ sudo dmidecode -s bios-vendor | grep Google
Google