6 ms·

In my homelab I've got RPis running Minio (S3-compatible block storage), step-ca (local certificate authority), CoreDNS (local DNS), a local gpsd/chrony setup (

In my homelab I've got RPis running Minio (S3-compatible block storage), step-ca (local certificate authority), CoreDNS (local DNS), a local gpsd/chrony setup (for local GPS-backed NTP, using the Uputronics GPS hat), shairport-sync (AirPlay server), and some web services fronted by Caddy. A great way to learn and try out various services, Linux distros, infrastructure management options, etc.

rcarmo 5y ago
I've been thinking of re-casting Piku (https://github.com/piku https://github.com/piku) as a set of Caddy configs and little more, but haven't had the time to bunch together all the necessary plugins - but Caddy is a great base for building anything web-related.
baby-yoda 5y ago
this is all on my homelab to-tinker list - any further comments you can share? assuming with a CA, DNS and NTP everything stays up without missing a beat if you lose WAN for some time?
- tashian 5y ago
  The CA and NTP server would hum along just fine. The DNS servers, less so: CoreDNS is reading my internal DNS zone from an Amazon Route53 private zone. This was my way of dealing with running two DNS servers concurrently, but it wouldn't do well in a WAN outage. And, once I lose internal DNS, I lose everything else too I've written about the CA for Smallstep: https://smallstep.com/blog/build-a-tiny-ca-with-raspberry-pi-yubikey/ https://smallstep.com/blog/build-a-tiny-ca-with-raspberry-pi... I wrote a piece about the NTP server, but I haven't had a chance to post it yet. There are some good resources out there for creating a local NTP server, though. It takes some time and effort to get everything dialed in, because GPS and NTP are both finicky and easy to misconfigure. I'd LOVE to write more about my homelab, but it's a work in progress that continues to evolve, and I haven't documented things as well as I'd like to!
sunsetSamurai 5y ago
how would you get started learning these things? I've always wanted to do something like this but I don't know what begin with
- doubled112 5y ago
  Pick a project (or better yet, a problem), and make it happen. Pick an area and tinker in it. There's not really much more to it than that. You may need to learn a ton as you go if you don't know the basics of the area the project is in. Software based projects are probably easier than hardware based projects in the sense that you won't lose money to change your mind. On a RPi, you can always just rewrite the SD card and carry on. No harm, no foul. You're not counting on it like you would your main machine (until you are).
tksb 5y ago
You ticked so many of my proverbial boxes with this and now I'm crossing my fingers you've written about any of it somewhere for public consumption!
- scruple 5y ago
  Seconded. I just finally was able to snag two RPi 4s and they arrive today and I'm planning on going a similar route as the GP.
- tashian 5y ago
  I've written about the CA for Smallstep: https://smallstep.com/blog/build-a-tiny-ca-with-raspberry-pi-yubikey/ https://smallstep.com/blog/build-a-tiny-ca-with-raspberry-pi... I'd LOVE to write more about my homelab, but it's a work in progress that continues to evolve, and I haven't documented things as well as I'd like to!
zdkl 5y ago
> Minio (S3-compatible block storage) What are you using for storage? Powered HDD over USB or something?
- tashian 5y ago
  Yep, a SATA SSD that runs over USB 3.0 is very fast on the RPi4, as long as you make sure "UASP mode" is enabled (this can take bit of tinkering). You don't even need external power, just a $5 USB to SATA cable.
  - sslalready 5y ago
    Anecdata: I’ve found USB powered external drives to be unreliable on the Pi, even when powering the Pi with an official power adapter. I’d recommend using an external drive that comes with its own power adapter.
    - antongribok 5y ago
      Counter anecdata: I've got a Ceph cluster running on multiple RPi 4s using external Seagate 4 and 5 TB portable hard drives. So far zero issues for about 1 year since I bootstrapped this cluster.. I use a combination of official RPi 4 power supplies and an Anker 6-port USB power block that I'm pretty sure tops out at less than 3 amps. More importantly, everything is plugged into APC UPSes.
  - copperx 5y ago
    What is the UASP mode for?
    - magicalhippo 5y ago
      Generally much faster than the traditional protocol[1]. However some USB SATA IC's have issued with it on Raspnberry Pi[2], requiring one to disable UASP. I have some JMicron-based USB-SATA adapters which falls into this category. [1]: https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2020/uasp-makes-raspberry-pi-4-disk-io-50-faster https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2020/uasp-makes-raspberry-... [2]: https://forums.raspberrypi.com/viewtopic.php?t=245931 https://forums.raspberrypi.com/viewtopic.php?t=245931
newman314 5y ago
How do you like the Uputronics GPS hat? I have the Adafruit Ultimate GPS on another Pi but have been casting around for another GPS system/chip to play with for NTP.
- tashian 5y ago
  It's been great. Very reliable on the hardware side, I've never had any issues with it, but it did take a while for me to get it set up properly.
  - newman314 5y ago
    Awesome, I think I'll get one then. Would love to see your NTP writeup whenever you post it. FWIW, I did see this but it's $$ : https://store.uputronics.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=60_64&product_id=123 https://store.uputronics.com/index.php?route=product/product...

rcarmo 5y ago

I've been thinking of re-casting Piku (https://github.com/piku https://github.com/piku) as a set of Caddy configs and little more, but haven't had the time to bunch together all the necessary plugins - but Caddy is a great base for building anything web-related.

baby-yoda 5y ago

this is all on my homelab to-tinker list - any further comments you can share? assuming with a CA, DNS and NTP everything stays up without missing a beat if you lose WAN for some time?

tashian 5y ago
The CA and NTP server would hum along just fine. The DNS servers, less so: CoreDNS is reading my internal DNS zone from an Amazon Route53 private zone. This was my way of dealing with running two DNS servers concurrently, but it wouldn't do well in a WAN outage. And, once I lose internal DNS, I lose everything else too I've written about the CA for Smallstep: https://smallstep.com/blog/build-a-tiny-ca-with-raspberry-pi-yubikey/ https://smallstep.com/blog/build-a-tiny-ca-with-raspberry-pi... I wrote a piece about the NTP server, but I haven't had a chance to post it yet. There are some good resources out there for creating a local NTP server, though. It takes some time and effort to get everything dialed in, because GPS and NTP are both finicky and easy to misconfigure. I'd LOVE to write more about my homelab, but it's a work in progress that continues to evolve, and I haven't documented things as well as I'd like to!

sunsetSamurai 5y ago

how would you get started learning these things? I've always wanted to do something like this but I don't know what begin with

doubled112 5y ago
Pick a project (or better yet, a problem), and make it happen. Pick an area and tinker in it. There's not really much more to it than that. You may need to learn a ton as you go if you don't know the basics of the area the project is in. Software based projects are probably easier than hardware based projects in the sense that you won't lose money to change your mind. On a RPi, you can always just rewrite the SD card and carry on. No harm, no foul. You're not counting on it like you would your main machine (until you are).

tksb 5y ago

You ticked so many of my proverbial boxes with this and now I'm crossing my fingers you've written about any of it somewhere for public consumption!

scruple 5y ago
Seconded. I just finally was able to snag two RPi 4s and they arrive today and I'm planning on going a similar route as the GP.
tashian 5y ago
I've written about the CA for Smallstep: https://smallstep.com/blog/build-a-tiny-ca-with-raspberry-pi-yubikey/ https://smallstep.com/blog/build-a-tiny-ca-with-raspberry-pi... I'd LOVE to write more about my homelab, but it's a work in progress that continues to evolve, and I haven't documented things as well as I'd like to!

zdkl 5y ago

> Minio (S3-compatible block storage) What are you using for storage? Powered HDD over USB or something?

tashian 5y ago
Yep, a SATA SSD that runs over USB 3.0 is very fast on the RPi4, as long as you make sure "UASP mode" is enabled (this can take bit of tinkering). You don't even need external power, just a $5 USB to SATA cable.
- sslalready 5y ago
  Anecdata: I’ve found USB powered external drives to be unreliable on the Pi, even when powering the Pi with an official power adapter. I’d recommend using an external drive that comes with its own power adapter.
  - antongribok 5y ago
    Counter anecdata: I've got a Ceph cluster running on multiple RPi 4s using external Seagate 4 and 5 TB portable hard drives. So far zero issues for about 1 year since I bootstrapped this cluster.. I use a combination of official RPi 4 power supplies and an Anker 6-port USB power block that I'm pretty sure tops out at less than 3 amps. More importantly, everything is plugged into APC UPSes.
- copperx 5y ago
  What is the UASP mode for?
  - magicalhippo 5y ago
    Generally much faster than the traditional protocol[1]. However some USB SATA IC's have issued with it on Raspnberry Pi[2], requiring one to disable UASP. I have some JMicron-based USB-SATA adapters which falls into this category. [1]: https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2020/uasp-makes-raspberry-pi-4-disk-io-50-faster https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2020/uasp-makes-raspberry-... [2]: https://forums.raspberrypi.com/viewtopic.php?t=245931 https://forums.raspberrypi.com/viewtopic.php?t=245931

newman314 5y ago

How do you like the Uputronics GPS hat? I have the Adafruit Ultimate GPS on another Pi but have been casting around for another GPS system/chip to play with for NTP.

tashian 5y ago
It's been great. Very reliable on the hardware side, I've never had any issues with it, but it did take a while for me to get it set up properly.
- newman314 5y ago
  Awesome, I think I'll get one then. Would love to see your NTP writeup whenever you post it. FWIW, I did see this but it's $$ : https://store.uputronics.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=60_64&product_id=123 https://store.uputronics.com/index.php?route=product/product...