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Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

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Re: Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

#131

Post by firecall »

beezischillin wrote: post #115
kd913 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can I heavily recommend the use of them as a pihole + Wireguard VPN + DNSCryptProxy Server. Pihole -> Great use for a network wide adblocker/DHCP server. Wireguard VPN -> In combination with a DDNS setup and some port forwarding enables the use of a global private VPN. I think it's a prerequisite for a decent home-automation setup. DNSCryptProxy -> Great for ensuring all DNS requests on the network via DNS over HTTPS…

I ended up Tailscale for Wireguard myself. I was really worried about letting all these server software out on the wide open internet because I can't guarantee I'll be around 24/7 to monitor in case of a security problem and this way I can be lazier. :) The added benefit is that I can force all devices to use PiHole while connected to Tailscale and have DNS-adblocking on the go!

Upvote for Tailscale.

I find it super useful!

Even if just for remoting into various boxes; the kids for instance often tether their PCs off their phones or I'm tethered and want to remote to my LAN.

(I have terrible internet)

Re: Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

#132

Post by kingosticks »

theHIDninja wrote: post #110
mattmoose21 wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Anecdotal evidence. They are built like absolute trash and it's a miracle anybody says they work for any reason. As is your experience. I have had about 8 pi's (zero,2,3,4) without any issue and I have never heard anybody else with the amount of issues you've had. I think they are ubiquitous because they are inexpensive, well documented, and fairly well made. They would clearly not be as popular if everyone had your…

>well made They are made from the floor sweepings in Sony's factory. You don't hear about the failures because most people just buy them and throw them away. I would venture to guess that about 60% of their customers are one-time buyers that try to power it on once and throw it away because it doesn't work. The other 40% either won the lottery or put up with its constant stream of shit because they have a near monopo…

I wish I could transfer my incredible raspberry pi luck to the actual lottery. I'd have won so many times.

In reality, fully working raspberry pi boards are normal. I must have at least 10. I admit I no longer use the original model (so slow) but last time I tried it worked just fine. I think that's pretty great for the money, especially considering the state of the market before they came along which I think you might be forgetting.

Re: Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

#133

Post by II2II »

MonaroVXR wrote: post #125
II2II wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do the same thing, with a different mix of services: - The obligatory PiHole. - An ssh server, which I use to access my internal network. - A script that scrapes a website daily. - A database to support a web development project. - A web server to support a web development project. - An NFS server, for data backups. While it is probably underpowered to serve the needs of some people, it serves my needs. Since I don…

>- A database to support a web development project. What language, frameworks, modules and how do you store and present it?

It's a basic Apache/PHP/PostgreSQL setup. This is a private project that I am working on to collect information on and plan recreation programs. The scope is sufficiently narrow that I don't see much of a need to expand beyond that setup.

Re: Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

#134

Post by kd913 »

yumraj wrote: post #106
kd913 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can I heavily recommend the use of them as a pihole + Wireguard VPN + DNSCryptProxy Server. Pihole -> Great use for a network wide adblocker/DHCP server. Wireguard VPN -> In combination with a DDNS setup and some port forwarding enables the use of a global private VPN. I think it's a prerequisite for a decent home-automation setup. DNSCryptProxy -> Great for ensuring all DNS requests on the network via DNS over HTTPS…

> DNSCryptProxy -> Great for ensuring all DNS requests on the network via DNS over HTTPS. Kind of useful because frankly ISPs are sniffing DNS traffic. Also useful for bypassing DNS based ISP filters. If you're using PiHole, you can just use cloudflared to do DoH. https://docs.pi-hole.net/guides/dns/cloudflared/ On a different note, biggest reason I've never installed a VPN at home is because I just prefer a deny-eve…

I use DNSCryptProxy because I can use it with Firefox as a local TRR server, supports additional filtering, supports DNSCrypt and ODoH caching and is open source.

It also picks from 140 or so anonymous DoH relays, with specifics for nologs and dnscrypt support.

Why would I go for just 1 arbitrary provider rather than the lowest latency choice out of 140?

I also think the latter point is a bit overblown. So long as you keep your kernel updated and you only expose a single high UDP port, it should all be fine. I have ufw enabled on each pi, along with various logging mechanisms in place to see if things seem reasonable. That and 2fa for actual ssh access.

Re: Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

#135

Post by rasfincher »

phamilton wrote: post #98
aweiland wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any good tutorials on setting up Wireguard? This (and Pihole) have been on my todo list for a while.

I'd recommend just using Tailscale. It's wonderful.

Tailscale is great. It's really changed my world and it's so dang simple.

Re: Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

#136

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 »

kd913 wrote: post #26
Damogran6 wrote: post #20

My RPi's are like lottery tickets. I buy them with the thought of all they could be used for...then collect duct in the junk drawer. I also tell myself I'm supporting the manufacturer, though it would appear they don't need my help.

Can I heavily recommend the use of them as a pihole + Wireguard VPN + DNSCryptProxy Server. Pihole -> Great use for a network wide adblocker/DHCP server. Wireguard VPN -> In combination with a DDNS setup and some port forwarding enables the use of a global private VPN. I think it's a prerequisite for a decent home-automation setup. DNSCryptProxy -> Great for ensuring all DNS requests on the network via DNS over HTTPS…

I do something similar but different choice of software. There is much more that is possible using this approach (distributing exact same hardware with preinstalled configs to each network particpant). These RPis are gateways. They are gateways to an overlay network controlled by users and not surveilled by "tech" companies trying to sell ad services. I like to imagine them as modern day IMPs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interface_Message_Processor

Re: Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

#137

Post by northwest65 »

jgust wrote: post #57
moduspol wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it scratches the same itch for me as it does for my wife looking at Instagram recipes. The end result clearly looks amazing. I'd really like to get into doing that, but every time I try, it ends up being way tougher than it looks and the net result is nowhere near as clean as it is in the pictures.

This comment isn't aimed at you specifically, but I hope it helps: You're looking at the 10th, 20th, 30th+ attempt being documented/curated on the internet. You've gotta break a few eggs to make an omelet, so don't let that not-so-perfect first try slow you down if you derive value from tinkering.

If you hadn't have posted it, I would have!

Much like writing code, you collect knowledge along the way and the next one is hopefully better.

Re: Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

#138

Post by synergy20 »

kd913 wrote: post #26
Damogran6 wrote: post #20

My RPi's are like lottery tickets. I buy them with the thought of all they could be used for...then collect duct in the junk drawer. I also tell myself I'm supporting the manufacturer, though it would appear they don't need my help.

Can I heavily recommend the use of them as a pihole + Wireguard VPN + DNSCryptProxy Server. Pihole -> Great use for a network wide adblocker/DHCP server. Wireguard VPN -> In combination with a DDNS setup and some port forwarding enables the use of a global private VPN. I think it's a prerequisite for a decent home-automation setup. DNSCryptProxy -> Great for ensuring all DNS requests on the network via DNS over HTTPS…

for $18 you can have this instead : https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0932J39HC?ref=myi_title_dp&th=1

I run pihole with 256MB version(which is $1 less) for two years fanlessly, and this includes enclosure too, load the software and hook it to my wireless router's ethernet port and just forgot about it.

Re: Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

#139

Post by spikej »

knodi123 wrote: post #102
Damogran6 wrote: post #20

My RPi's are like lottery tickets. I buy them with the thought of all they could be used for...then collect duct in the junk drawer. I also tell myself I'm supporting the manufacturer, though it would appear they don't need my help.

I have three. One was going to be a home security and automation server, but in the end, every feature it had was either something my family wound up hating, or something that worked 9 out of 10 times and was therefore useless, or something that proved slightly harder than I expected and was therefore too much trouble. So now, all it does is loudly announce the time of various things, like "Time to pick the kids up f…

Try installing DietPi with Pihole

Re: Nine Raspberry Pis powering an office (2016)

#140

Post by tempfs »

benttoothpaste wrote: post #87
albertzeyer wrote: post #9

We use a small drink kiosk touch pad powered by Rasperry Pi, using this simple software project: https://github.com/rwth-i6/drink-kiosk Works great. Except the SD card seems to be dying now after 3 years of constant usage (well, less usage during the enforced home-office times).

3 years for SD card is very long. Mine requires SD card replacement after 3-4 months. I hate that storage medium.

Add something like this to your /etc/fstab. Will save a few touches to the SD card and enhance system security a little. My last SD went for 3+ years on a decently busy little Pi.

  ##
  ## Decrease touches to root partition a little with noatime flag
  ##
  /dev/mmcblkp  /               ext4    defaults,noatime  0       1


  ##
  ## decrease writes because tmp activity by mounting as tmpfs
  ##
  tmpfs /tmp tmpfs ddefaults,nodev,nosuid,noexec,noatime,mode=1777 0 0


  ##
  ## /dev/shm security measure
  ##
  tmpfs /dev/shm tmpfs defaults,noexec,nodev,nosuid 0 0
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