I don’t have a home server yet but I’m exploring and sometimes I get confused about some posts here.

For example I saw a post asking for recommendation for a “self hosted budget management app”. Can’t you just install this type of app to your phone or pc? What’s the purpose here, will you host it and access it from a browser? Or do you only want to backup its data to your server?

I hope I don’t sound stupid please enlighten me.

  • @IsPhilB
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    17 months ago

    I think for a lot of people as well, a big factor is when you share that data between multiple devices, if you use your own solution, then you don’t have to trust other companies with your data.

    • @PuckSRB
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      17 months ago

      No, but now you have to trust yourself with security.

      It seems to me to be a bit of the fly vs drive debate. Flying is objectively safer, but lots of people get more freaked out by it because they have zero control over the outcome.

      • @Big-Finding2976B
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        17 months ago

        Flying is only safer than driving until the fuel runs out, then you’re much safer in a car 😉

        • @maomaocakeB
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          17 months ago

          actually when a plane runs out of fuel it doesn’t drop out of the sky, a trained pilot can glide the plane down (eg Hudson River landing ) mow if u r on a highway and u run out of fuel the car behind u might hit u

      • @neonintubationB
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        17 months ago

        I think the threat model is sufficiently different enough for self hosters versus commercial offerings that it is possible to maintain a comparable level of security to what you’d enjoy elsewhere with significantly less technical training. E.g., I run a home server using a point-to-point Wireguard configuration such that only devices I’ve explicitly set up with Wireguard can access any of its services. My ports are very quiet.