Thanks for the extra details! I mean, it does make sense the way you are guiding the use case for the project. It’s just not my use case :)

In any case kudos for the job you’ve done!

Hey, pussies are great, don’t compare them to that idiot.

Very promising! If I understand correctly though, I can’t even create a note in offline mode to sync later? That would be a bit of a deal breaker for me personally. I couldn’t see much details on e2ee either, but maybe I missed that. Anyway, really well done!

This is surprising… And completely unmanageable from a user’s point of view. In order to find what licenses it has I need to browse folder by folder in the code, instead of, you know, having a list of licenses and where they apply.

On a quick look I saw only two places with a special license, one is the example indicated by the developer of the server package which is an odd license that gives me pretty bad vibes for my lack of legal knowledge but probably is ok? It might even be reasonable, but what is the server package? Is that the server I self host? Or the server for paid Joplin? Then I found some other code that was an MIT license… But how deep do I need to go searching in the folder structure to find all licenses? This is irritating. I guess I gotta consider changing to something else then if only to be able to know what license I am using.

Also… What is the legal implications of using a software than upon any update might suddenly add a weird random license? Would that mean I am expected to keep checking all foldernevery time they change something?

As someone with similar feelings in general and a similar history, I feel you are blaming only the latest and worse effects on tech and of tech on society.

I started my career in parallel with mobile devices and smartphones. The whole idea of new possibilities, new ways to interact with tech, miniaturization, etc., is what called me most as it was a huge field starting and I tried to find my path forward. I’ve seen from close, real close, how an incredible tech, full of possibilities has been slowly been captured by the market capitalists that inevitably always ended up controlling the direction of every company.

This is not caused by crypto, this is not caused by LLMs. The origin is greed and capitalism. Decisions being made to make number go up.

Really, crypto is a fascinating tech, it’s not the fault of the technology that crypto-bros came to conquer everything and misuse it and abused it to make a quick buck.

LLMs are impressive, think about it, we have managed to completely break the Turing test. We have machines that sound so human that mostly everyone is in a constant suspicion that everything they see is made by an LLM. LLMs sound so human that they are full of confidence and mostly always full of shit. Just think about it, AI is just a representation of humanity, what we do with it just represents and highlights the issues in society.

The reality is that those two, have just suffered a faster, the fastest we’ve seen yet probably, tech lifecycle - growth, hype, plateauing, and eventually decline and enshittification of any service related to the tech.

Consider search engines, their demise is not because of AI, AI is just the last blow. I used to be very good at finding what I wanted, I knew how to use the tool to make the best of it. Slowly over the years much as I want, I cannot get the results I want without a lot of effort. I haven’t somehow become shit at it, the tools and the tech have been modified and changed until it has become useless, the whole point is not finding anymore, but making you search as much as possible.

Consider the mobile hardware field as it is now, compared to the years when it started blowing up with all kind of devices and possibilities. The market has been captured, a few companies remain, releasing the same thing over and over with the latest and bigger number each year. Slowly the whole wild world we had of custom roms, has been captured so that if you get out of the fenced field your apps won’t work because it is not safe. Apps check that you are using them in an unmodified and perfectly controlled OS where you own nothing. Apple has always been king of fenced fields, but now Google is doing all it can to imitate it, squeezing in and trying to capture as much of their open field into their very high fenced safe areas. They want to control the source of apps, the developers, and remove the freedom from the devices. It’s crypto and LLMs at a slower pace. Working for so many years as a developer I can feel how I’m more and more tied up to the whims and wishes of companies that don’t pay me the salary, I keep bringing this up and make a safer path for the future but the company that does pay my salary doesn’t care, they just want the latest BS and hyped concepts.

People like you or me, we have a special vantage point. We know how we can still fight that, we know what are the alternatives, we know what the tech could become. We need to bring that knowledge to everyone, keep pushing for FOSS solutions, keep teaching everyone that tech is not difficult, it’s not magic, but it requires learning and education. It requires not falling on the path of less resistance, and fight against lobbying and market capture. It’s tough, when we just get so tired of constantly fighting it. What I think you find so tiring is not Crypto and LLMs but how tech is being guided to its demise, to become a tool for control and nothing more.

Hmm so how does the workflow look like for you? Is the calibre web tied up to the DB of that calibre VNC? Do you manually add the books to calibre over the VNC? Then is calibre web allowed to make changes to the DB or does it have read only access? as far as I understand calibre is not recommended to have multiple sources of changes to the DB as it can end up corrupted or something? (At least it can’t resolve conflicts I think)

As a solution it seems like it could work, but it feels like over complicated to get around the limitations of calibre.

I’ve been using calibre since around 2009 and it is an incredible piece of software. For handling ebooks, specially for eBook readers and file formats, it has no equal. Unfortunately it is built around the idea of installing it into one computer and connecting your eBook to it. Which makes it a bit clunky in my opinion nowadays.

Maybe calibre web fixes that, I need to check it one day. For actual books I think it falls between that and booklore.

All the other options seem to be more indicated to comics and manga, which is another aspect I’ve been noticing calibre does not do such a great job. I think I’ll have to keep two different ones, one for reading from a tablet comics and such and another for ebooks to send to the reader.

No apologies needed, I’m not even OP :) it was just a long shot :D

Are you in Europe by any chance? :)

Awesome comment!

About the dashboards, I have been using CasaOS for a while now, it is not a OS, but it decently handles containers and allows you to install a bunch of services in a very user friendly way. Nowadays (as I found out a few days ago) the project seems to be moving in the direction of a fully purposed OS with NAS capabilities plus the containers stuff. Unfortunately the project (under the name ZimaOS) has gone into proprietary software and (for now) a one payment level to unlock full options with a free limited version.

I don’t think I can recommend anymore to go with casaOS due to that (although for now casaOS remains free OSS kinda separate). I have been also looking for alternatives to set up a NAS and so far I am heavily leaning on OMV as it is a full OS with the idea of handling a NAS with all ready, plus it is based in Debian which is a plus for me too. Alternatively I am looking into YunoHost also, but I think it is not exactly what I want, although it looks promising.

Edit: forgot to mention FreedomBox as another option that can work as a NAS OS of sorts that helps with self hosting services too.

Thanks for the feedback! I’ll definitely check it up as I try to build a NAS to deal with the extra storage needs.

I have been using casaos and sincerely it is great as a simple solution to avoid some hassles. On the other hand if you are already handling those things yourself and are fine with it, it might have less value.

I am considering some changes and now I am finding out that maybe having a backup of the configuration to set it up again later is not something I can get in casaos.

Is ZimaOS even worth considering if is not Open Source?

For me personally this is a key aspect. I would avoid any proprietary solution, or you will be left in a position where you have no control of your data. I definitely won’t be checking zimaOS.

Instead I want to check and maybe try yunohost or freedombox.

I just want to bring to attention something I was just finding out thanks to this post.

I started self hosting some stuff by installing raw in arch and well… It was a pain, but worth it. Then later I found out about CasaOS, which is recommended by OP, and I agree, it was great to have it to install some more services and a lot easier. But just like OP I just found out about ZimaOS, which is announced even in casaOS project as a better system and an upgrade. So I went to check and the whole project is changing from open source in casaOs to proprietary in ZimaOs. Not content with that, in the latest release of ZimaOs they have added a one time payment to eliminate some limitations of the free version. It is still affordable and a “lifetime” license but if they have added a payment for full access once they might do it again, despite their current promises that they won’t ever make a subscription style payment.

So, careful with that project, I would recommend to avoid any solution that is proprietary or otherwise it won’t be yours in the first place. I had in mind to change from CasaOs in Debian to OpenMediaVault to handle a DAS and install casaOS on top of that. But now I have to reconsider, so far I have already seen a few worth recommendations in this post that seem nice: FreedomBox and YunoHost to mention a couple that are FOSS.

Oh wow… I’m going to set this up right away, I’ve always loved this feature on google maps, but as I’ve been removing google from my life I was afraid of losing this but I definitely don’t want to give any more of my data. This is perfect! Thank you so much!

Edit: torilla tavataan i guess :)

Well hello all again. I come with an update, after a few days of looking around and searching for options after all your valuable feedback and input.

For all those saying “backups” and “3-2-1”, yes, very important indeed and has given me extra to think about, but it is also not really what I was looking for. That doesn’t mean your input was bad, wrong or unused, it made me think deeper about that topic too and plan towards it, but it was not answering my original question, needing a better, safer, data storage solution hopefully using OSS.

As I already have a couple old laptops I would rather avoid getting extra hardware in that sense, and the idea of the DAS, which was new for me, seemed exactly what will provide what I need. Expandable storage solution to stack some HDDs, I can connect that to one of my existing laptops where I can install OMV (openmediavault) to deal with the drives and storage and use it for the storage of data. I’m getting a centmate with 4 bays, I’ll put one drive for now of 14 or 16 TB and later add another mirrored with btrfs or raid 1. In the future I’ll increase the space as needed.

For the backup I’ll keep using my external drive connected to the other laptop where I’ll probably keep EndeavourOS for now. The most valuable data I will set syncthing or some other alternative but I already have backup of some of the most important stuff so I’m not in a hurry with it.

I think at the time I have the kind of plan I needed. So thank you all for giving some advice, experience, and knowledge. It has kicked me out of indecision hell.

OK, that’s actually a nice point to clarify, and to be sincere I kinda saw it as a backup. But thinking it more thoroughly, it is the kind of “backup” I am looking for. I worry mainly about the hard drive crapping out on me. Then after that yeah, I would have an external HD with the most important stuff backed up and then something out of the house.

To be perfectly clear, I agree entirely with your comment. What you say is extremely important, but the NAS is the actual aspect I need for the house at the moment :)

I said truenas as it was the first to come to mind but it is probably overtly complex for my needs and openmediavault might be better, as far as I can use an open source software on whatever hardware I end up with I’m happy.

Yeah I want an external drive out of the house, but I feel like that is independent of my decision on how to store data at home. Am I wrong? Should I take that into consideration for choosing a nas at home?

Indeed, RAID1 is what I’d probably choose to have a safety net in case of hard drive failure. Something simple to start with.

So after all you just have a normal PC using arch with a handful of disks? So is some of the disks holding copies of the others? I’ll check btrfs, to see what kinda use it can provide.

Hmmm this is the kind of thing I fear of using something like synology, maybe it works better for me, but even then I doubt I will ever be able to make it work for me and I will end up annoyed about lack of options or settings.

Maybe I didn’t say it clearly, but I am not against pre-made hardware, I just want to be able to use any is I want to.

Yeah it is just that, but I want to make sure I have the set up correct for the proper data transfer, and data copying/syncing.

But this is where I lack experience, is a mirrored drive any simpler to maintain than a Raid 1? Wouldn’t a raid 1 help with access speed of data?

Hmmm more options seems like the best way to keep my paralysis healthy :P

Thanks for showing me your set up! I’ll have to check what would be the price range for me to get this kinda thing. My desktop has plentybof space but I wouldn’t want to use it as the nas.