I also tried TrueNAS scale once (but I think at the time it was quite new so maybe not how it is now) and didn’t like it either so I won’t speak about that.

If it were literally just for network storage and nothing else I guess the way to go might just be to hook up a usb drive to ones router (if it supports that). So most people probably do want slightly more or at least the option to expand capabilities without having to fundamentally change their setup.

But in general I would say that yes, the web interface is definitely part of the appeal. I think what something like Openmediavault offers is that someone else chooses sensible presets, it gives an easy to use gui that allows oneself to get stuff done without any major technical knowledge, and it also creates a community with a shared similar setup that can offer support.

I guess it depends on what one wants from the server. Of course you can have a plain Debian or whatever installation and do everything yourself. But for most, especially the less technical knowledgeable, it is nice to have some interface for setup and maintenance stuff.

I guess if you want specific recommendations you need to define your needs and requirements a bit more.

Since I was wondering if Cockpit is an option for immutable distros I stumbled on this video, which seems to suggest it might since it is used on one there. So I guess you could pick your favorite immutable distros and see if Cockpit works to have a easy gui for managing the server stuff.

You could of course also go for something like NixOS and make everything declarative.

For me Openmediavault was easy to set up and just works for the little stuff I want it to do.

I (very much an amateur) briefly tried TueNAS scale in the past and didn’t like how they did apps. So I switched to Openmediavault, which since then has served me very well.

With a plugin I could easily add my zfs raid and I use their build in docker compose gui to run the few programs I need.

I didn’t try out others, but there are more options. CasaOS and yunohost already got mentioned, there is also Cosmos or just running a basic server with e.g Debian and maybe adding Cockpit for some management gui.

Disagree that HBO is trash. But the issue is that even if one doesn’t like and avoids them, they shape the perception of other people. So no matter how much/little oneself engages with them, you can’t really escape the indirect effects.

What I find particularly problematic is the conflict of interest between Tesla and xAI, especially because Elon has a higher percentage of ownership of the latter.

It’s clear that Tesla is priced not as a car manufacturer, but as a technology company with high (arguably delusional) hopes towards self driving, compute and robotics. However that kind of seems like a natural area to expand into for xAI as well. So why should Elon do it at Tesla where he has less ownership?

Btw xAI acquired X, so one less company. From what I remember at the time the purchase felt like Elon taking advantage of other investors and getting a very favorable deal for himself due to the company evaluations, which increased his ownership stake in the combined company.

Frankly, if the company you invested in does not give you dividends, then you are a fucking chump.

That’s just not true. There are plenty of reasons why fast growing/expanding young companies shouldn’t pay dividends, if they have better opportunities to put capital to work (if you disagree with their assessment you sell the stock).

And even in mature companies dividends aren’t always good. Just look at Intel and Berkshire. Intel should have cut the dividend way sooner and is now in a worse spot because they didn’t. Berkshire on the other hand is by all accounts a healthy and well run company. If you want to take profits you just sell some stocks and if Berkshire thinks that price is to low they repurchase some of that stock.

Since I just saw this in the self-host weekly post:

Do not upgrade to 13.0.0

Seems like there is a bug and one should use 13.0.1

See here

It gives you and the users of your jellyfin instance a nice UI dashboard to search and request movies/series. The requests then get handed off to radarr/sonarr for downloading via your downloader (e.g. Sabnzb)

Instead of having to go into the less polished sonarr/radarr that would also expose some settings that you might not want other users to change, you get a nice dashboard. Similar to how you’d browse on a streaming site.

It shows you currently popular movies/shows and upcoming highly anticipated ones, you can search for a specific movie and when you click on it you get a helpful site. It displays all kinds of info similar to jellyfin, like cast, tags, relevant other movies, links to sites like rotten tomatoes or letterboxd, and so on. You can also search for persons and it’ll show you what they’ve been in/have produced. And when you want something you can easily request a download in your preferred quality setting.

You also may limit what and how requests from different users are handled.

Just set this up a few days ago and so far am very happy. Ended up choosing it over other options since I wanted something that saves the downloads in a humanly accessible way by simply putting them into channel folders with the video names as title.

If you want to setup a stack take a look up TRaSH guides. Then it goes roughly like this.

You have software that search and make the download requests: radarr (movies), sonarr (TV shows), lidarr (music), bazaar (subtitles, if you need to add more that don’t already come with the movie/show). But there might be others e.g. for porn or like here for YouTube.

Those forward the request to a downloader like Sabnzb if you are using usenet or qbirtorrent for torrents.

Those above are the main ones and from there you can add things that make your life easier:

• Prowlarr: sonarr/radar need an indexer to search, instead of configuring them in each software this allows you to do it once and then sync across the other apps

• Overseerr/Jellyseerr: if you want a nicer frontend to search and make download requests instead of doing so in radar/sonarr.

• Recycler/Notifier/Configarr (all do roughly the same): sonarr/radarr allow you to configure specific profiles to score the quality of downloads so you can get them in the format you desire (e.g. so you want 1080p or 4k, HDR yes or no). These allow you to sync custom formats with sonarr/radarr that others like trash-guides have developed.

• Tdarr: if you would like to reencode and compress movies to save space this allows you to do so in an automated way. Although you usually I’d imagine it might be easier to just setup a better profile in sonarr/radarr and download the desired version (should you e.g. want x265 encoded versions)

I don’t have one myself, so I can’t really recommend a specific model from experience. There are many available, but I’ve e.g. seen beelink mentioned a few times. Maybe someone else here is running one and can give some recommendations?

If you are facing availability issues I’d to the reverse and rather then asking for recommendations look at what’s available and then do a quick search or ask about it (e.g. if someone has already used it with whatever Linux distro you plan on using). Should you have access to something like AliExpress then there are plenty of options.

Maybe a mini PC with a N100 might be worth a look? Especially when factoring in running costs over it’s lifetime

I mean in the server space Linux has already won and is doing just fine. Imo it is actually the reverse and sad that it needs this level of turmoil to get Europe to even think about software and digital infrastructure as fundamental. And even with all that’s going on they are just dipping their toes into it rather than properly comitting to a radical shift. Hell, even with all that’s going on some parts of the police here in Germany are still getting into bed with companies like Palantir.

Agreed. I hope this gains even more traction. Building a digital economy around support and service of free open source software with the requirement of personnel being local seems like the best way for Europe to finally become competitive.