I'm not going to dissuade anyone from trying to get into the code. Even if you can't do anything, it's a good learning experience. I helped to write up
instructions on getting a build environment working. They might be a bit outdated at this point (not sure if the external modules have changed at all), but the broad strokes should work.
Of course, having the code and knowing what to do with it are very different things. But you can't get to the latter without having the former. So, give it a shot. The worst thing that happens is you end up with a useless VM on your computer that you never use and a few hours of lost time.