This Week in Self-Hosted (3 January 2025)

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This Year in selfh.st

2024 was a great year for self-hosting. There was no shortage of great new projects to explore and developers continued delivering significant updates to existing software. We also saw a few leaders in the space begin to lay out the principles as to how open-sourced and community-driven projects can operate and thrive will still maintaining their core values.

It was also a great year for selfh.st. Having only been its second year of publication, I'm overwhelmed with the community's support as the site achieved significant milestones and launched a number of new initiatives throughout the year:

• This Week in Self-Hosted registered its 12,000th e-mail subscriber in December
• In April, I launched selfh.st/apps – a directory of self-hosted software that now consists of 900+ browsable projects. As of today, the directory receives just shy of half a million views a month.
• In September, I launched selfh.st/icons – a collection of almost 1,000 dashboard icons and logos that are now natively supported by four self-hosted applications (and with at least two more on the way)
• I also continued my annual self-hosted user survey in September, which received ~3,700 responses – almost double the amount from 2023
• In October, I launched a new weekly YouTube series and podcast to accompany the newsletter (which is currently on a two-week hiatus due to the holidays and sickness)

I also had the opportunity to connect with a number of developers and content creators who've been incredibly willing to collaborate and provide feedback when asked, including Adam Monsen, DB Tech, Dan Brown, Daniel Brendel, Akash Rajpurohit, and Jason Crabtree – to name a few.

Looking ahead, I'm excited to share some new initiatives in the coming weeks and months as I dedicate 2025 to expanding my video offerings, welcoming guest contributors to the site, and continue developing resources to spotlight self-hosted software.

I'm incredibly grateful for this community and the opportunity to give back to the people that have shaped my own self-hosted journey. Thanks again to all for the support.

Happy new year, and happy selfh.st/ing!

In the News

My Favorite Self-Hosted Apps Launched In 2024

A look back at some of my favorite self-hosted software and applications from 2024

selfh.stEthan Sholly

Introducing Jellyfin Wrapped: Your 2024 Year in Review!

Discover your year in entertainment with a personalized recap of your Jellyfin watching habits

What Happens to Relicensed Open Source Projects and Their Forks?

Contributor impact varies after projects adopt more restrictive licenses, finds CHAOSS research on Elasticsearch, Redis, Terraform and their forks.

The New StackDawn Foster

Software Updates

• BookLogr v1.2.0 | Library Tracking: Pre-built Docker images, event sharing via the fediverse
• Caddy v2.9.0 | Web Server: Various refinements and bug fixes
• ClipCascade v2.0.0 | Clipboard Sync: Multi-user support, enhanced encryption, new environment variables, role-based authentication
• Donetick v0.0.25 | Task Manager: New designated completion window, historical completions on User Activity screen, new Points View for tracking earned points
• Endurain v0.7.0 | Fitness Tracking: Unified Docker image for deployment, license update from GPL-3.0 to AGPL-3.0
• Gatus v5.15.0 | Status Pages: Custom CSS support, Pushover condition results, exposed uptime data as text via API
• Immich Power Tools v0.11.0 | Photos: Logo screen at start, Google Heatmap, updated rewind UI and data, added previews in find
• Jellyseerr v2.2.0 | Media Requests: Special episode setting, PostgreSQL support, base helm chart, override rules
• Nginx Proxy Manager v2.12.2 | Reverse Proxy: PostgreSQL support, new DNS providers, custom configuration for 404 hosts
• Postiz v1.22.1 | Social Media Scheduling: Added support for Lemmy
• Ryot v7.14.0 | Tracking: New tab in people details for groups, support for pausing workouts, rest timer confirmation, edit custom metadata
• Strava Statistics v0.2.0 | Stat Tracking: Initial support for running activities (requires .env file update)
• Tempo v3.9.0 | Subsonic Client: Sort and search functionality in lists, ALAC codec support, continuous playing, local server addresses
• Zoraxy v3.1.5 | Reverse Proxy: New architecture for future SSO implementation, new default site options for closing connections, external Geo IP database mode

New Software

• ARK: Survival Ascended Linux Server Manager
• Caddy WAF: Web application firewall middleware for Caddy
• Cloud Storage Manager: Web app for easily managing and sharing files
• Docker-StaticMaps: Containerized version of StaticMaps
• Econumo: Personal and family budgeting app
• ExerciseMinimilism: Single-file and local browser daily exercise tracker
• GoShort: Fast and customizable URL shortener
• Habit Tracker Wheel: Habit tracking with a unique wheel-based interface
• HabitTrove: Gamified habit tracking application
• LinkStash: Bookmarking and read it later application
• PawTunes: Web-based internet radio player
• Pi-DNStack: Automated deployment for Pi-hole, Unbound, and Cloudflared
• Plexy: Alternative web UI for Plex
• qbt-resumer: Automatically restart errored qBittorrent downloads
• Quantum: Open-source alternative to Heroku, Netlify, and Vercel
• RSS.Beauty: RSS beautification tool
• SSH Tunnel Manager: Docker-based solution for managing SSH tunnels
• Surmai: Personal and family travel organizer
• Tirreno: Open-source security user analytics
• Wembat: Simple to use authentication and encryption framework
• World Arcade: Run generative games on your own GPU

NordVPN’s holiday deal

The most festive sale of the year. This holiday season, save big and get 3 extra months when you buy the world’s leading VPN.

NordVPN (Affiliate Link)

Latest Directory Apps

• Antora: Modular documentation site generator
• Diskover: File indexer, search, and management platform
• Habitica: Role-playing gamified habit tracker
• Immich Android TV: Android TV for Immich photos and videos
• Lurker: Read-only Reddit frontend
• PoeticMetric: Privacy-focused alternative to Google Analytics
• Riven: Media streaming with various third-party integrations
• Storyteller: Create and read eBooks with synced narration

Community Content

My Favorite Apps, Tools, and Services of 2024

Web apps, tools, and subscription services I discovered or started using this year that I love

Cool As Heck

Ntfy — Self-hosted push notification server for all your services

Ntfy is a simple yet powerful pub-sub notification service that lets you send push notifications to your phone or desktop from any of your self-hosted services. Perfect for monitoring, alerts, and automation in your homelab.

Akash RajpurohitAkash Rajpurohit

Building My First NAS: Lessons, Speed Bumps, and Why I Kept Going

What Even Is a NAS? For anyone wondering, NAS stands for Network-Attached Storage. In simple terms, it’s like having your own personal cloud at home. A NAS is a device that connects to your network, lets you store files, and makes them accessible across devices—whether it’s family

Abhishek's BlogAbhishek Ranjan

Content Spotlight: Lurker

Meet Lurker, a self-hosted read-only frontend web client for Reddit. With Lurker, users can enjoy the benefits of saving and browsing their favorite subreddits as if they were a registered user without the privacy implications of actually registering. Features include saving subreddits, over-18/NSFW content, mobile support, pagination, invite-only multi-user support, color schemes, and comment navigation – all without a Reddit account.

Lurker can be installed via bare metal or Docker and doesn't require any additional containers to be deployed (SQLite is leverage for data storage).

Links: Source Code

What I'm Watching

• Unleash Your Creativity with Excalidraw: A Powerful Virtual Whiteboard | DB Tech
• Home Servers Might Never Be The Same... HexOS Is Here | Hardware Haven
• 10 Best Home Assistant Features This Year! - Rewind 2024 | Everything Smart Home
• Build Your Own Ad-Free Search Engine with 4get and Tailscale | Spaceinvader One
• Container vs VM: Hypervisor War is Over! | VirtualizationHowto
• How To Self Host Behind CGNAT With Wireguard and pfsense | Lawrence Systems

Command Line Corner: uniq <file>

Use the uniq command to easily view the unique lines of a file from the command line:

/$ cat example.txt
  This
  This
  Week
  Week
  in
  Self-Hosted
/$ uniq example.txt
  This
  Week
  in
  Self-Hosted

Click here to view an archive of commands shared in previous newsletters.

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