Aside from Plex, what other apps are running in your own Mac server?
Iāve just got a Raspberry Pi running Apache / PHP Web Server to accept GitHub Issue webhooks and turn them into Pushcut triggers on iOS. The purpose is to make a new GitHub issue turn into an OmniFocus task. (It uses a Shortcut, obviously, to create the actual task.)
I had to use port forwarding (for port 80) in my router to do it. But now I can serve to the wider internet lots of automations become possible.
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HomeBridge! Thatās a big one for me. Iām also running Sonarr and Radarr to help me organise my Plex library. I have Calibre for my ebook library too. Iām also running some Telegram bots for friends (dice based things for D&D).
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Not on my Mac but my Synology with Docker - Pi Hole for ad blocking on all devices.
I soon might have a spare Mac mini (which I could use as a personal server), but for now a Raspberry Pi is sufficient for running:
- Homebridge
- MQTT broker
- automatically renewing Letās Encrypt certificates
- my homebrew IFTTT replacement (converting RSS entries to tasks)
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Hazel and Dropbox (with all files synced locally) work together to keep my Dropbox organized.
Horcrux does backups of my various email accounts.
Resilio Sync for things I donāt sync via Dropbox.
All of my iCloud files including iCloud Photo Library are downloaded locally so they can be properly backed up (see also Dropbox with all files synced locally).
Itās also a Time Machine server.
Thatās all that comes to mind, but there may be other details Iāve forgotten.
BackBlaze - I use CCC to backup our other Macs to the server and everything goes to BackBlaze. Subscription for one computer backs up everything.
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I have kind of gone overboard
- Two synology drives, one serves up Plex and is an internal DNS
- Two Raspberry Pis - one running PiHole and the other OctoPrint for 3D printer
- Server running docker containers with Traefik as the reverse-proxy entry point:
- media: Sonarr, Radarr, Lidarr, Ombi and downloaders
- Admin: Portainer, dozzle, Heimdall, glances, watchtower, docker-gc for managing the containers
- DB: MySql and Postgres (used by various containers) MyPhpAdmin, MyPgAdmin
- Teslamate / grafana, MQTT
- HomeAssistant
- cloudflare utilities for DDNS and external DNS management
- Jenkins for builds which is tied to my github account
Iāve written a wrapper that manages groups of these containers in docker
I also have an offsite server (digital ocean) that essentially runs a mail server for another domain I have that is also based on my wrapper script.
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Well hello there, new rabbit-hole. I have a Mac Mini and a Raspberry Pi that arenāt really doing much of anything right now. Setting up a server sounds like a project with a set of potentially useful outcomes, based on some of what Iām reading hereā¦
Bearing in mind that some Raspberry Pis are in the mix, Iām guessing that the server itself doesnāt have to be a particularly high spec machine? And do any of you run UPS systems in case of power outages?
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Depends on what you want the server to do. My Synology is a Intel one (DS220+) but I only went with that one as I could use Docker and virtual machines if I wanted. I donāt use Plex, as I use Kodi on an nVidia Shield, so no need for transcoding. The Raspberry Pi would in reality accommodate all my needs.
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yes, despite not running anything except plexā¦
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Unless you need macOS stuff like Time Machine, Content Caching, etc., a Mac Mini makes an awesome machine to run Debian on. My 2010 Mac Mini runs homebridge, Grafana, Prometheus, nodeRED, AirPrint and more and hardly breaks a sweat.
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Yes! My Mac Mini, monitor, Windows server, and Raspberry Pi are all on the UPS. Granted, my power outages so far have been one flicker in a huge storm, and the power being turned off for electrical work a few times - when my meter is changed next month itāll be handy again! I just have the Amazon Basics UPS. Itās nothing fancy, but it does the trick.
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If thereās one thing you learn from living in FloridaĀ¹, itās that anything you care about should be on a UPS.
To wit:
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I have two UPSes in my office.
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There are two UPSes in the garage with the Mac mini and iMac + hard drives.
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Our TV, cable box, cable modem, AppleTV, and other Mac mini are on two UPSes in the living room.
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My sonās PlayStation is on a UPS in his room.
You should hear this place when the power goes out. 7 different UPSes all chiming at various times to alert you that the power is out. Fortunately that doesnāt happen often.
Florida
Ā¹ I havenāt lived in Florida since 2003, but ~5 years living with daily rain and frequent thunderstorms left an impression.
I can still remember all of the times Katie and David would talk about this, and Katie was like āMy entire house is on a UPS 
ā and David was like āI live in California. 
ā
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You donāt have to live in Florida. Just living in the (Oxfordshire) countryside is enough - especially if the power lines are overhead (or underground). 
Weāve had more than enough power (and broadband) outages over the years. Probably time to invest in UPSā.
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On that point Iām finding my Pi 3 - which also has my touch screen StreamDeck-alike permanently running permanently - is more than enough.
But note Iām talking āorchestrationā, not actual deep computing. (I might well set it up as an mdpre / md2pptx server for making PowerPoint decks from Markdown for iOS (which I have done in the past) but even that probably wouldnāt render it unresponsive for other tasks.
(Fuller disclosure: I seem to have also ended up with 2 x Pi 4 and a Pi WH, with the latter attached to a breadboard and the former two doing little right now.)
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Thank you. Something ELSE to play with.
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