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What I Self Host

(fredrikmeyer.net)
116 points FredrikMeyer | 1 comments | 20 Oct 25 16:07 UTC | HN request time: 0.25s | source
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zahlman ◴[20 Oct 25 16:35 UTC] No.45645835[source]▶
There seems to be a fad for "self hosting" things now. What I don't understand is: what happened to just having a single device and having it run the code directly and show you the result directly? For example, why can't the thing that connects to the Spotify API just... do that, from a program that runs locally, independent of a web browser, with a GUI created using a standard non-web GUI toolkit? Why would I want to use it by pointing my browser at a machine name (of another device I own) and port number, rather than by launching a dedicated program?
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1. estimator7292 ◴[21 Oct 25 01:54 UTC] No.45651611[source]▶
A lot of the stuff we're selfhosting just.... isn't a standalone application. My mastodon server has to run always to get messages. My nexcloud has to be always on to get my phone backups.

The only thing that might make sense to be local is media, but only if you don't share with someone else and you want to maintain an offline copy of your library on each device you use.

In general, it's stuff that needs to be shared or needs to run 24/7. A lot of that just doesn't make any sense as a desktop application.

All rationalization aside, it's a hobby. It's fun. People spin up hulking enterprise gear at home and run jellyfin just for kicks. It's not supposed to be at all practical or to even make sense. It's silly nonsense on purpose.