Homelab Runner
(Alternatively titled "Of Coaches and Cartoons")
This week our home's Pi-Hole suddenly stopped working. I'm not sure exactly what happened, the week before I attempted to upgrade it to Pi-Hole 6 and the upgrade failed because the Raspberry Pi was on a previous OS version. My best guess is that the system actually stopped working at that time, and the lag for DNS updates, etc., made it only noticeable this week.
So, the past few days I've spent a fair bit of time completely redoing our home infrastructure. I did a complete clean install and upgrade on that Raspberry Pi to the new Raspberry Pi OS and even more than that, really diving into Docker.
Previously my installs were standalone and not containerized. Now I've got it all running through Docker. Docker is a tool which contains these applications in their own environments.
So, the infrastructure in the house is run on basically two systems:
Pep (named for Pep Guardiola, I name my Raspberry Pis after coaches.) - Pep previously ran two things: Pi-Hole and Home Assistant. Now, I am just using it for Pi-Hole.
Pi-Hole is a fantastic tool that you can integrate in your network to block ads, trackers and more. The way it works is you tell your router to put every DNS request through your Pi-Hole, and it filters these requests and basically tells your router that the problematic URLs don't resolve as if they didn't exist. It's like uBlock or other ad blocking tools in your browser, except for your entire network.
You can subscribe to URL lists like ad blockers in your browser, etc. It's a huge quality of life improvement to have that blocking across your network, not just your computer, but also TVs, iPads, etc.
The other machine is Marvin (named for Marvin the Martian, I name my desktop PCs after Looney Tunes characters.) It was my old desktop PC and has been working as the house's media machine, and now, I'm having it do more.
Previously it just ran Plex, an internal streaming app for watching movies and TV. Now I have it running Home Assistant, and I am experimenting with a few more things.
Home Assistant is a tool that manages home automation. Theoretically Pep could run both Pi-Hole and Home Assistant, and did in the past, but I am beginning to question if the Raspbery Pi for Pep may be going out on me since I've had it for six/seven years. So, I am leaving Pep to do one job and expecting it to do it well, and putting Marvin (which is leagues more powerful than Raspberry Pis) to do more.
The truth is I'm only barely using Home Assistant. It could do so much more. I basically have it to run two automations for lights around the house.
So, more than Plex and HA, here are some of the new things I'm experimenting with on Marvin.
- DoneTick - A shared to-do / task app. I envision being used by Katie and me for house chores, etc.
- Actual Budget - This is a finance management app, however I have been coming up a core issue
Actual Budget is supposed to be fantastic. However, I can't get it to work yet. The issue I am facing is that when it isn't run on the computer you're using, it requires HTTPS for web access. Which is completely logical for a finance app, however when dealing with home networks that isn't straightforward. And that is the issue I'm running into. I've tried a few times this week to figure out the HTTPS certificate but it continues to elude me. I'll get it eventually.
Both of these systems contribute to what people call a "homelab." Homelabs are basically this, technology and networking and computers used for home projects etc. Interestingly, I can't seem to find where the term originated. Maybe I'm overlooking it.
So this has been my work for the past few days. I've enjoyed it, as of course something new for my ADHD to glom onto.
Now, back to trying to crack the HTTPS issue I have.
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Marvin Upgrade
Marvin, our entertainment home server, got an upgrade today as I added a new hard drive, where the previous 4 TB drive had been reaching its capacity. My Linux admin skills are far from complete, and I had to wrestle with a few things along the way. But, at this moment, files are transferring and backups are being made.
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Guest WiFi using a QR code
I have been meaning to do this for my own house. Sharing here because surely some of you have as well. The post explains how to do this, but lacks a link to the QR code generator, this is the one that is shown in the post.
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Just had a good ole' 20 minutes wrestling with the home modem and wifi router. At the core, I think the issue was that in rebooting our system I jiggled the network cable loose or at least ajar such that the modem and router weren't talking. Eventually got it worked out.
What is most interesting is, since I use my pihole as a full DNS router, I could see my streaming devices go absolutely fucking nuts pinging back home to try and reconnect. It's a dramatic spike:
Looks like they peaked at 13,000 requests over 10 minutes. Talk about being needy.
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Home Network Survey
I did some snooping on my home network, partially because I was trying to see if my wifi camera really required the app or if I could find another way to access it, but on the way to exploring that question I took stock of my home network:
- 3 PCs (home desktop, work laptop, linux laptop)
- 1 iPad (Wife's daily driver)
- 3 phones (wife's iPhone, my work iPhone and my personal Android phone)
- 2 Raspberry Pis
- 4 Streaming devices (2 Rokus, 1 Chromecast, 1 Fire stick)
- 1 Gaming system (Nintendo Switch)
- 1 WiFi Printer
- 1 Smart speaker (Google Nest)
- 1 Wifi camera
- 5 Smart switches & outlets
Fascinating at how the world has changed. To move from a dial up internet connection for one computer, to this era of always-on Internet for a nearly unlimited number of household devices. As I continue down the road of the smart home and internet of things, that number will continue to grow. I have one more smart switch to install, not sure where as it's original location is no longer viable. And I am also curious to look into things like a wifi garage controller, etc.
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