I’m an English teacher who wanted to “cut the cord” wherever I could, so I started learning about domain hosts, containerization, .yaml files, etc.
Since then, I’ve been hosting several pods for file sharing and streaming for many years, and I’m currently thinking about learning kubernetes for home deployment. But why?
If you aren’t in development, IT, cyber security, or in a related profession, what made you want to learn this on your own? What made you want to pick this up as a hobby?
R/buyfromeurope brought me here. Already got a NAS and discovered that it can run docker.
The question is not why to start, but when do you stop, lol
I’m working in pharmaceutical production industry and I have started selfhosting few months ago.
I wanted to replace google photos with immich, cause my photo collection approached 200gb and I didn’t want to upgrade to 2tb version. My gf also had same problem
Bought second hand mini pc for 100€ to test to see how it goes and if I had decided to go back, i would have sold it.
Initially I was following FUTO guide, but quickly noticed it was too extensive and complex for my setup. I managed to set up immich with reverse proxy, did few mistakes here and there, but when it finally worked, I got hooked. I now have:
- local backups to external drive (borg-web-ui docker)
- ntfy. To send noticiation to my phone after backup had finished
- diun. To notify when docker update is available
- dockgee. docker management
- tailscale. Remote access
All of it comes gradually, I’m tinkering with home assistant vm now.
The increasing clarity that “big cloud” is one of the most existentially dangerous threats in the long term. The idea of not truly owning my own data, particularly in an era where truth itself is becoming more and more malleable, became intolerable.
Secondarily, the desire to get off the subscription hamster wheel and own all my own media.
Piracy, basically.
Self-hosting wasn’t my intention, I just wanted a media server. Then a media server that downloaded all my stuff easily. Then a server that was more accessible. Then a server that had better Wife-Approval-Factor.
Former English teacher here. My self-hosting origin is that I had 20 years or so of teaching materials I’d collected in OneNote over that time and simply wanted to have offline copies so that I could feel that if ever something went wrong with Microsoft like getting permanently locked out of my account, then I had a means of restoring everything. Microsoft makes it practically impossible to export to a working backup.
After spending a LONG time trying everything to get back ownership of my materials, I understood the need to move my digital stuff away from big tech. I bought a Synology NAS, learned how to use Docker and then took more steps. About the same time I started using Fediverse apps and learned a great deal from the discussions and links there. My greatest “learn” has been keeping notes in plaintext files (and not getting seduced by nice shiny new apps that are actually horrors that want lure you into a future subscription).
Besides privacy also moral reasons, using megacorps services means giving them money/power/data which in turn helps them do all the direct & indirect evils they do & influence (from exploiting monopolies & influencing demand side, to lobbying for lower taxes & legislature to keep/increase their monopoly, even just blankly supporting fascists political options bcs that has a great chance to enrich their shareholder value regardless of all the other effects, etc).
You know, try to leave a better place than you got it & whatnot.
I’ve always been kinda technically motivated. The only reason I didn’t actually study computer science is that I had a great math teacher who made me fall in love with math. But I had it for a minor, and like to read stuff up from time to time. So, I guess I’m kinda in the grey area in regards to being a person in tech.
Anyway, I love tinkering with stuff, so I inevitably got into self hosting. Nowadays, I’ve even started maintaining some self hosted software.
Because I hate big tech and I want control of my media.
I reached a breaking point with the number of SaaS that I was having to pay for monthly, so I started taking steps to eliminate my subscriptions one by one
That’s interesting. Can you elaborate?
Well… I bought a Philips hue starter set. And I had heard of mqtt, zigbee and pihole. And I had a spare raspberry pi.
Now that got out of hand and I am looking at a proxmox cluster….
😁 There’s a game called Factorio you might like.
I couldn’t think about leaving my personal data to the Big Tech…
I’m a mechanic.
This is both my reason and explanation lol.
I do my own work has been said to be taken a bit too literally in my case. I got ripped off by Geek Squad when I was 18 and said “wow, it’s just like getting ripped off at a shitty mechanic shop” and ever since then it’s been all hands-on.
career
I sat on that fence but being a mechanic gives me guaranteed work and I basically work-out every day. It’s hard, but not brutal and the pay is decent. Surrounded by maga tho.
I’m also a mechanic, I self host for basically the same reasons and I just don’t like the idea of big tech spying on me . Definitely a lot of MAGA, it’s fucking annoying hahaha.
-Cable is insanity. It’s companies are corrupt and awful.
-Watching sports is a maze of what channel/TV package/subscription service did I need again?
-Far fewer means of owning the media today means they can jack up the price as much as they want. Fuck that.
I’m a social worker by background. It all started with running Linux on my desktop.
From there, the possibilities seemed endless.
I was going to think up something more elaborate, but this is enough.
I’m also a bit of an electronics
hoarderrecycler, which probably got me into Linux in the first place. And Linux proved me right: old hardware is still good. My first server was a 32 bit laptop.I also work in the social sector btw.
Linux - the gateway drug.
Its gotta be the sox.
That’s the way to go! I’m sure you didn’t want to go back to Windows after a while. That was the start for me, too, back with Ubuntu Jaunty Jackalope.
Lemmy has been a big part of it.
I’ve never been fond of paying big tech to spy on me. It has been getting gradually more expensive and more intrusive for years. Around the time I reached a breaking point, folks here helped me realize that digital sovereignty is possible.
One day I was just like, “Why does Google need to know when my lightswich is on?” And that was the start of it.
