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Screw it, I’ll host it myself

markozivanovic.com

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Re: Screw it, I’ll host it myself

#241

Post by harikb »

While I agree shit happens, it is sad to see exaggerated stories without sufficient details being repeatedly quoted by other people

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26311417

In addition, traditional non-tech companies screw people on a regular basis. I know I am resorting to whataboutism, but let us not panic and try to build our own cloud. One has to consider what happens and when one gets decapitated in a autonomous driving accident and the family is left with a home-made cloud

Re: Screw it, I’ll host it myself

#242

Post by kmonsen »

bachmeier wrote: post #151
planb wrote: post #9

Funny headline, because every time I try to self-host anything important like mail, I learn how deep that field is and how little I know and that I'll probably need many many hours to do everything right and in a secure way (and my mails would still have a higher probability to be classified as spam). Then I think: "Screw it, I'll just use GMail"

> self-host anything important like mail Email is basically pointless to host yourself from a privacy perspective. Every email has one or more people on the other end that also get a copy. Privacy and email are mutually exclusive. That said, the alternative doesn't have to be something like gmail, where they can do whatever they want with your data. I use Fastmail and that's "sufficiently private" for my needs.

Also you disconnect email from other cloud services. So if you do something bad with your android app development you don't suddenly loose your email.

Or if you forgot to pay your apple card you don't loose access to the email etc.

I think diversification is valuable here.

Re: Screw it, I’ll host it myself

#243

Post by lisper »

kmonsen wrote: post #240
lisper wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VPS doesn't solve privacy and security, it solves getting locked out of your account because some algorithm decided you were peddling child porn. If you want privacy and security and you don't trust your provider, then you have to build your own hardware and compile everything you run on it from vetted source, including your kernel. You can do it, but most people decide that on balance its better to trust someone.

Howso? The VPS can shut you down as well? You might say the migration path is easier, but there will be a weak link somewhere. Even if you put up a datacenter in the basement you need to connect to the internet somehow which can be taken away.

> Howso? The VPS can shut you down as well?

Yes. but VPS is a standardized commodity. If one provider shuts you down you can just switch to another.

Re: Screw it, I’ll host it myself

#244

Post by devwastaken »

dr-smooth wrote: post #189

The problem I have always had when building elaborate home server setups is the "set it and forget it" nature of the systems I've installed bites me in the ass. Since it's not my full-time job to manage these systems, I'm really not familiar with them the way I might be with the systems I manage at work. These systems cruise along for years, and when something finally does go belly-up, I can't remember how I set it u…

What I sometimes do is make a bash script that does all the setup. save it in the home folder. You can just copy/paste each line from the script to set things up again and you'll be able to know exactly what you did to the system later on.

Re: Screw it, I’ll host it myself

#245

Post by Havoc »

TheCapeGreek wrote: post #218

Isn't $55 a bit high in total cost? Aside from the 2 servers for projects, all of those aren't going to need entire servers just for 1 user. I've run Nextcloud doing all the same stuff for half that price and don't think Gitea or Monica would add much overhead. I'm aiming to do a lot of the same (and more) but definitely aiming at a much lower monthly cost.

Would be better off getting 1 large VPS and using nested virtualization (or just straight docker).

That way all the services have access to all the cores and you can thin-provision too if desired.

(Nested virt being enabled is not a given though)

Re: Screw it, I’ll host it myself

#246

Post by reaperducer »

lisper wrote: post #77
ziml77 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am perpetually confused about why people think that self-hosting on a VPS solves their privacy and security problems. While I'm sure there are controls in place at reputable VPS providers, it wouldn't be too difficult for them to grab absolutely anything they want. Even disk encryption doesn't save you. You're in a VM, they can watch the memory if they need to. Using a VPS can also make you more identifiable. Your…

VPS doesn't solve privacy and security, it solves getting locked out of your account because some algorithm decided you were peddling child porn. If you want privacy and security and you don't trust your provider, then you have to build your own hardware and compile everything you run on it from vetted source, including your kernel. You can do it, but most people decide that on balance its better to trust someone.

VPS doesn't solve privacy and security, it solves getting locked out of your account

Does it really? It just seems like instead of trusting a big company that everyone knows, you trust a smaller company that not everyone knows that involves more work for you.

I'm pretty sure I've seen articles on HN where VPS companies (maybe DO?) have kicked people off their infrastructure with zero notice. So, not at all different from being locked out of Apple/Google/Amazon.

Re: Screw it, I’ll host it myself

#247

Post by diarrhea »

dr-smooth wrote: post #189

The problem I have always had when building elaborate home server setups is the "set it and forget it" nature of the systems I've installed bites me in the ass. Since it's not my full-time job to manage these systems, I'm really not familiar with them the way I might be with the systems I manage at work. These systems cruise along for years, and when something finally does go belly-up, I can't remember how I set it u…

I just use a docker-compose stack (one yaml file next to a bunch of subdirectories) templated out in Ansible.

Ansible will be around for a while, but even if it's not its (yaml) syntax is incredibly easy to read. Any successor in that area is somewhat likely to have compatibility or at least a migration path.

This together reaps the benefits of Docker (enhanced through Compose), and Ansible is documentation in itself. There's barely any actual comments. The code speaks for itself. Also, I can reproduce my stack with incredible ease.

Re: Screw it, I’ll host it myself

#248

Post by dheera »

mattowen_uk wrote: post #79

Y'know what, Although I'm currently self hosting my email, my websites, my storage, my SQL, my Active Directory etc., I'm also in the process of migrating the whole lot to Azure and/or independent hosting. Why? It's just too much hassle these days; I want my down-time to be no longer dictated by my infrastructure. I don't want to have to spend off-work hours making sure my boxes are patched, my disks are raided, my o…

I stopped self-hosting as soon as I moved out of university. Back in university I had a gigabit uplink and only 1 power outage in 7 years of my PhD. Now in the middle of Silicon Valley I have only 15-20 mbps and have had 3 power outages in 1 year.

Re: Screw it, I’ll host it myself

#249

Post by bogwog »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #206

I think it's great that people are publishing their home server setups. At the same time, the scary sounding warnings of "You're at risk if you put your trust in another company to hold your data!!" ring really hollow to me. I mean, does this person keep all of his money under his mattress, or does he put it in a bank (though I guess he could keep it all in crypto...)? Does he buy insurance, or again just keep a moun…

Money in bank accounts is insured by the government, but our data and privacy isn't.

> and the systems in place to safeguard that trust

How many systems are in place that safeguard our privacy and our data?

Re: Screw it, I’ll host it myself

#250

Post by lisper »

reaperducer wrote: post #246
lisper wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VPS doesn't solve privacy and security, it solves getting locked out of your account because some algorithm decided you were peddling child porn. If you want privacy and security and you don't trust your provider, then you have to build your own hardware and compile everything you run on it from vetted source, including your kernel. You can do it, but most people decide that on balance its better to trust someone.

VPS doesn't solve privacy and security, it solves getting locked out of your account Does it really? It just seems like instead of trusting a big company that everyone knows, you trust a smaller company that not everyone knows that involves more work for you. I'm pretty sure I've seen articles on HN where VPS companies (maybe DO?) have kicked people off their infrastructure with zero notice. So, not at all different…

> Does it really?

Yes. VPS is a standardized commodity. If one provider shuts you down you can just move to another.

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