This article is a list of several stuffs that can help you selfhosting simple, quick and easy so that even your family and parents would be able to use. Selfhosting means making your own online services at home rather than borrowing someone else's server, for example, you can build your personal website, search, video broadcasting, even email, social media network and file sharing too. This list includes all-in-one hardware and software solutions, like Freedombox and Yunohost, and excludes individual components like RaspberryPi and Apache. All tools mentioned here are free libre open source software explained at the end. These technologies hopefully can save you time and resources to setup to achieve just work as close as possible. Finally, you are hoped to have the basic knowledge in server computing. Enjoy!
Freedombox, fastest way to selfhosting
Freedombox is the hardware and the software and here we meant the hardware: it is a portable computer bundled with complete software packages to create your own online facilities at home. It allows to create your own internet services, either it is like Search (Searx), Blogger (WordPress), Ngrok (PageKite), YouTube (PeerTube), Hangouts (Jitsi), Meet / Slack (Matrix or XMPP) or else. It features a beautiful control panel so you can also add more applications to your Freedombox. The operating system is Debian GNU/Linux modified in a certain way to suit selfhosting.
Mail In A Box, email selfhosting
"Mail-in-a-Box lets you become your own mail service provider in a few
easy steps. It’s sort of like making your own gmail, but one you control
from top to bottom." That's the crystal clear explanation from its website. Please note, according to them, email system is complex so (unless for limited use) you cannot make a home email server otherwise other email servers will often consider mails from you as spam. Alternatively, there are another FLOSS selfhosting mail tool namely iRedMail, Mailcow. and Modoboa.
Yunohost, all-in-one selfhosting software
Why you do no selfhosting? That's Yunohost spirit, it is a complete software suite based on Debian GNU/Linu that once installed to a machine it became a server of choice for the user no matter whether it is an email, website, broadcasting, video conferencing or file sharing server, even social media network (Mastodon) or beyond. By this view, Yunohost is pretty suitable to knowledgeable users with ability to setup the system. However, today Yunohost is software only and we cannot buy one device preinstalled with it unlike Freedombox.
Nextcloud,
Libre server suite able to replace Google Cloud (Calendar, Contacts, Drive, Docs, Meet). Create your own online storage under your full control in your personal or corporate custody. To have a Nextcloud at home, you may want to buy a Nextcloud Device explained next section or install it yourself with Yunohost.
Features:
- online storage
- file sharing
- video conference
- desktop sync
- phone sync
- calendar
- add-ons
Nextcloud Devices
Purchasable portable computers with Nextcloud preinstalled. This is one of the quickest ways to selfhost Nextcloud at home or your company.
Awesome Directory
A searchable information directory all about selfhosting.
Awesome List
An awesome is a big list of useful things and this one is a big list of selfhosting software, services, and hardware curated by the community. When you find this article is too short, you can always refer to awesome. Hint: use Ctrl+F to find what you want there.
Podcast
Yes, there is a podcast for selfhosting people! It is called Self-Hosted and part of Jupiter Broadcasting, same network that publishes the legendary popular podcast Linux Unplugged, hosted by Chris and Alex. Want recommendation? You can start listening their 36. Google Docs Replacement.
Choice of Technology
This list mentions Yunohost not Cloudron because the former is libre software and the latter is proprietary software. We choose and prefer software that is free rather than proprietary. To understand the difference, one can read Free Software Definition.
Further Links
This article is based upon my Self-Hosting Resources Made Simple.
This article is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.