...

git clone git://fiz.stanford.edu/git/ramcloud.git
cd ramcloud
git submodule update --init
ln -s ../../hooks/pre-commit .git/hooks/pre-commit

(Notes: the git submodule update retrieves additional repos needed to build RAMCloud, such as gtest; the ln -s command arranges for various consistency checks to run during commits, such as ensuring the absence of carriage returns)

Don't worry about having read-only access; it really shouldn't impede you. We'd prefer to pull changes from you or have you send patches (see git-format-patch and git-send-email). This lets us ensure that the fiz repo is generally in a working state and is making forward progress.

...

git clone ssh://fiz.stanford.edu/git/ramcloud.git
cd ramcloud
git submodule update --init
ln -s ../../hooks/pre-commit .git/hooks/pre-commit

Compiling

cd ramcloud; make

...