Update: 8/22/2021 this is out of date…in the process of moving to a new server not yet detailed much.
The server you’re connected to lives in my home – reaching the internet with a residential fiber line from AT&T. I built this computer in 2019 basing it on the Synology DS-918+ which runs a customized version of Unix called DSM. The server supposedly maxes out at 4 GB but I thankfully manged to put 16 GB on it anyway 🙂 I’ve been slowly expanding it to do more and more and just put a web server on it September 2020.
Server Capabilities as Configured
These are some of the things I’m doing with this server to date…
- Deliver dynamic content on the web (web station, virtual hosts, php/sql database, wordpress)
- Host a virtual windows computer to remotely share programs like Quicken that have to execute on a Windows PC.
- Maintain synchronized directories across multiple workstations both remote and local, PC or phone.
- Organize pictures and videos synchronized with devices and selectively publish content.
- Stream movies and tv etc. to various media devices in my home or on the road etc. by hosting a Plex media server.
- Maintain a distributed todo list and personal notes synchronized across all my devices.
- Synchronize contacts to outlook, phone, or any other client that can access a standard cardDAV interface as hosted by my Synology Contacts application.
- Manage passwords and other sensitive information with bitwarden, providing distributed access and easy auto-fill on all devices while at the same time storing it all on my own hardware by hosting my own bitwarden service.
- Backup all my workstations from one management console including full or partial restore and file version history.
- Backup this server both on and offsite (with private key encryption applied before storage).
What will I add next?
Believe it or not I don’t like to stay down in the mud configuring stuff on my NAS all the time. I like to get it done and see it work and only do what I need to do but also accomplish my objectives. I don’t mind if it’s easy to do. It’s the method that counts. Impressively simple is better than impressively complex.
There are a lot of good guides out there but I really have to praise in particular Marius Hosting for their excellent walk-thrus that make things easy! Ultimately you might have to still understand some things that go behind his scope when things don’t work like expected. But you also might need nothing more and are WAY farther along with Marius especially if you don’t really understand how the big solution fits together.
Priorities
These are some things I have on my mind to implement or improve on this server.
- Replace the feed on my news page with a filtered aggregate of all news sources I care about.
- Look into the privatebin service that would let me securely send blocks of text by sending a link that displays the text – but the link might expire or be password protected (like a master password to make sure it’s you).
- Looking for a good way to post google maps content. I know how to embed a map by pasting the code in from the google site but I want to find something that does more of the work of posting a map that includes POIs and comments etc. Reading about the basic WP plugin for google maps seems like it has what I want?
Following the news
Here is a feed from the Unofficial Synology Forum that might have good things to know about…
[wp-rss-aggregator feeds=”synology-community”]