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My home servers are not a homelab

blog.nradk.com

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Re: My home servers are not a homelab

#31

Post by haiku2077 »

petesergeant wrote: post #25
bee_rider wrote: post #9

It is a bit of a shame, IMO, that the concept of an always-on home computer has basically died out, or maybe never even really caught on. A sort of digital shadow of the house, it could run a home email server and do any home automation/content hosting. Anyway, I think it is unusual enough that it will need describing whatever he calls it, so no need to stress about the name. I’d call it the home computer, haha. Ever…

> that the concept of an always-on home computer has basically died out I just don't see where it would fit into my life. I used to have an old desktop computer that I'd co-opted into an OpenBSD switch living on top of a cupboard when I was 19 or so, and it was a fun experiment for about a year, when the tiny amount of extra hassle it provided with the almost zero amount of extra benefit meant one day it was switched…

Mesh Wireguard VPNs like Tailscale/Zerotier/etc. have brought it back. Now you can self-host all sorts of stuff and your ISP just sees regular VPN traffic like a remote worker. Handy for self-hosted movies/TV, photos, ebooks, and NAS.

Re: My home servers are not a homelab

#32

Post by OccamsMirror »

jumploops wrote: post #12

Just call it a puddle :) 1. No fault tolerance or high availability 2. It can evaporate just as quickly as it formed 3. Same contents as the cloud (plus some local contaminants) On a serious note: I wish more of the homelab community was focused on self-hosting (puddles should be awesome!), but it seems to mostly be folks justifying the purchase of large amounts of used equipment for “education” (internet points).

Back in the day you set up a homelab with enterprise level hardware so that you could gain experience on hardware and platforms you otherwise wouldn't have access to. Cisco firewalls, VMWare Hypervisors, vSan, etc.

Re: My home servers are not a homelab

#34

Post by adfm »

JimRoepcke wrote: post #24

LAN

Seriously, this! OP has a LAN with a server(s) running local services. A home lab isn’t for them and that’s fine. They obviously recognize that others like to call their local setup a home lab. At an institution, it would be called a computer lab and has been since they’ve been around. Businesses have various names (closet, colo, noc, etc.) but they’re all servers and networking infrastructure. Maybe gear is the deciding factor. A home lab would more likely use professional gear where if you’re merely self-hosting with SOHO gear, it’s just a LAN. No lab needed.

Re: My home servers are not a homelab

#36

Post by nradk »

udev4096 wrote: post #20

A perfect example of creating problems out of nowhere. Does OP have nothing productive to say other than dunking on the term? Since when does "homelab" resemble to anything concrete? Edit: Looking at your "de-googling" post, which resembles a lot of privacy theatre, this just seems like nothing more than an attention grab

Well, I have nothing productive to say; overthinking nomenclature is probably even counterproductive. But I was actually quite curious to know if there are people like me who self host but don't use their setups primarily for experimentation or learning, and how they refer to their setup.. :)

Re: My home servers are not a homelab

#37

Post by zxexz »

brookst wrote: post #27
udev4096 wrote: post #20

A perfect example of creating problems out of nowhere. Does OP have nothing productive to say other than dunking on the term? Since when does "homelab" resemble to anything concrete? Edit: Looking at your "de-googling" post, which resembles a lot of privacy theatre, this just seems like nothing more than an attention grab

“My 1967 Camaro that’s on blocks with a couple of body panels off is not a ‘project car’”

No, at this point it’s more is a permanent art installation :D

For real though, I have several cars on blocks at the moment. I can’t think of a single way to rationalize not calling them projects, even though when they were put up it was just going to be a “quick fix”. At least I finally got one in a state where I felt comfortable donating it.

Re: My home servers are not a homelab

#39

Post by [deleted] »

brookst wrote: post #27
udev4096 wrote: post #20

A perfect example of creating problems out of nowhere. Does OP have nothing productive to say other than dunking on the term? Since when does "homelab" resemble to anything concrete? Edit: Looking at your "de-googling" post, which resembles a lot of privacy theatre, this just seems like nothing more than an attention grab

“My 1967 Camaro that’s on blocks with a couple of body panels off is not a ‘project car’”

[deleted]

Re: My home servers are not a homelab

#40

Post by zxexz »

I call it my deprod, or home office nonproductivity suite. Or fire hazard. Or “those f**ing wires”. I’ll usually refer to just a piece of it, like “my computer”, “my weird ARM switch”, or “that engineering sample that a guy sold me at the Flea for $10 and still hasn’t died after 5 years of being on”.

I use it to decompress. Sometimes, even, to learn. And always, for personal projects.

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