As TopCoder and CloudSpokes integrate, the APIs are going to play a critical role. TopCoder has already started work on a API, which can be found here. That API is built on a Java stack.
In order to accelerate development we are looking to move some of the API work to use a more cloud-friendly approach built on NodeJS. This is complicated by the fact that the back end of TC relies on an Informix DB.
We have provided clear steps to setup in CentOS 6.x, Ubuntu, MacOS and Windows, please check wiki
Other flavors/versions of linux should work, but have not been validated yet.