Sertraline. It’s helped hugely with depression and anxiety, though I think Covid helped with the latter as well. I struggle to feel anything much these days but it’s much better than feeling low and anxious.
Building and running my own server for self hosting multiple tools for my home.
-
Bitwarden Password manager, now sharing logins/passwords for stuff my fiance and I both use is easy, and every single website we use has its own unique randomly generated password so when one site gets breached, our logins aren’t compromised anywhere else
-
Plex, it’s like your own self hosted Netflix. My file copies of any movies/TV shows go on here and it parses em all, keeps it all grouped together, streams in 4k.
-
Shinobi, for my security cameras. Self hosted free CRTV application, works with any open spec cameras. Has movement detection and tonnes of other open source options for plug-ins.
-
Deluge, handy UI for downloading torrents onto my server. Conviently added presets to it that let me download to the very folders Plex scans… cough cough.
-
Kavita, self hosted server for books/pdfs. Some e-readers can even connect to it. A couple popular manga reading apps also work with it. Can also just use its own browser web interface as an e-reader, it has multiple options for styles (infinite scroll, page swiping, left/right click, and even supports right to left mode for manga!)
-
Nextcloud, pictures/document storage. Sort of like a selfhosted filesshare/file backup. Has a mobile app that can automatically backup every picture/video you take on your phone!
-
Gogs, open source super lightweight git repo. Has only the bare minimum of features, basic web hook, authorization, permissions, simple web ui to edit. It does the job I need it to and that’s good enough.
-
OpenVPN, self hosted VPN so I can securely access all the above stuff without exposing it to the internet.
-
Also I host my own websites on it, publicly exposed. Blog, a writing project, nothing terribly fancy.
Eventually I plan to add some more stuff to it. Migrate my smart home dependencies over to Z wave and install Home Assistant, so I don’t have to rely on sending my info to google/amazon/etc to do basic smart home stuff.
Shinobi is exactly what I was looking for. Thanks for the suggestion
I was using Shinobi for like a year, but I’m enjoying Frigate so much more now. Shinobi is definitely more feature rich though.
You may also want to take a look at zoneminder. I’ve had great luck with it over the years.
I personally would never recommend someone to self host a password manager. There’s a lot of things that can go wrong, and any number of them could cause you to lose your passwords or at least access to them when you need them. There’s a lot of value in paying $10/yr for Bitwarden, to have a clear mind, and know that your information is safe, and accessible.
The value in self hosting is your passwords aren’t exposed to the internet at all, and can only be accessed over VPN from outside the house.
If you care about security and you know how to run a network properly, then it’s definitely worth doing.
In terms of things that can “go wrong”, the first rule of homelab is “Back your stuff up”, and the second rule of homelab is “Back it up again”
The issue he/she is taking about is reliability of personal infrastructure. Its never run a password manager without HA, and since I’m not going to run servers in HA, I suppose I’m sticking to pen and paper for the important ones
Im not sure I would classify “back up your access key” as HA but you do you
Seriously, when you have a single small file which is that important, it’s really not hard to make sure it’s backed up in several places.
I’ve used Keepass along with dropbox/onedrive/nextcloud (changed over the years) for a decade now and never had a problem. I keep a backup copy of my database on a flash drive in case I somehow lose all my devices. Takes like 5 minutes to set up.
I would not self host a password manager, simply because I don’t want running something like that on a 24/7 online server.
Still, if I needed to run a password manager on a server, I would rather self host it than use a hosted service from someone else.
In my opinion, running such a service commercially is a much harder problem than self hosting it and has a much bigger attack surface.
This is IMHO what many people do not understand about hosting as a service vs. self hosting: The full time DevOps/Admins etc. people who work at the hosting service are hopefully better than me at hosting stuff. At the same time the problem they have to solve is so much harder than self hosting, that even if they are 10x as good as me, running my own little service with a firewall, rate limiting and monitoring should at least not be less secure.
In my opinion the risk of something killing my server and wiping my passwords out is much much scarier than the prospect of a semi competent company hosting them getting hacked. Like several orders of magnitude scarier.
Fair enough!
As I said, I would not host it myself.
My solution is much simpler and more redundant: A KeepassXC file backed up to different physical locations and 2 different cloud providers.
If I ever forget my password, I am totally screwed. :-P … but OTOH an event which would lead to the deletion of all of my backups at the same time would be extinction - level. ;-)
Excellent choices. Might I hint towards lovely alternatives?
Emby instead of plex (cheaper, and equally capable (use jelllyfin for really free but less reliable))
AgentDVR. Super reliable, mega flexible PVR totally free for private use. Even got options for AI-motion detection and stuff.
And especially: KeepassXC. You’ll never regret switching in time.
I used emby briefly after ditching Plex then settled on jellyfin. It’s been over a year and I’ve had no issues with reliability.
Maybe, I messed around with things about a year ago now
All the stuff I listed is also free for personal use. But yeah, all those are solid alternatives as options.
Thanks to you I have today discovered Kavita. It’s excellent!
That was a fair bit of scrolling to find the homelabber. Thanks
Plex
You should check out Jellyfin
Plex is getting shittier by the minute, and this is a good alternative.
While Plex has moved towards the “free” content, it still does remarkably well with apps on all devices. It also makes user management extremely easy without having to manage yourself. Password resets aren’t your problem if you share with others.
It has its limitations and it’s development budget isn’t in the self hosting space as much. But for what it is, it’s still a good value.
I havent had any issues with Plex so far, so I continue to use it. Ive definitely looked into jellyfin and it doesnt seem painful to swap over, but at the moment there hasnt been a compelling reason to make the switch.
I put media in my folder, plex scans it by the time I sit on my couch, I click button, show plays. No issues to speak of so far.
Ah interesting, I havent had such an issue yet, or at least not to a degree I notice it egregiously.
Try different subtitle files, usually if the first one is off, the second or third will sync up properly
Have been using Plex for years, thought I’d give Jellyfin a shot but my god how ugly it was 😩
I prefer how Jellyfin’s UI, but you can also use a third party client IIRC
-
First place, aSmartwatch.
I all but stopped checking every fcking notification, my life has become peacefull and tranquil.
Second place, my 4yo daughter. Achieved the exact opposite.
With a smart watch (I’ve owned a few over the years) my phone has been on silent for years. No more dings, beeps, or rings especially in meetings or with other people. I set it to vibrate only for text and calls. Game changer. I wish those in sales would use them more.
How does a smartwatch get you to stop looking at notifications?
Before, I picked up my phone at every ping or vibrate.
When I wear the watch, all phone notifications are automatically muted and the watch is set to only notify a few apps (Whatsapp, phone calls, calendar). No emails, no kik, no games nothing.
That’s a very smart idea!
I turned off all notifications but calls, missing a lot of things, but well, I guess it’s not that important if it’s not a call.
Still not answering call though. I’m not a logical person
You could have just disabled notifications for all apps except Whatsapp, calls and calendar on your phone.
Yeah but those notifications are still valuable, they just need to be dealt with on a daily basis not instanteously.
You can still do that with your phone
If you’re on Android, long-press the notification and select “silent”. The notification will still be there, but it won’t vibrate or light up the flashing indicator (if your phone has one). Smart watches are still useful, though.
that’s great but I don’t want a silent notification, I want it to buzz. 4 priority levels, watch>buzz on phone>silent on phone>snoozed until EoD
Makes sense. From your earlier post it sounded like there were only two levels needed: “deal with right now” and “deal with at end of day,” in which case “silence” works as a poor-man’s snooze for me because I don’t pick up my phone and deal with them unless it vibrates or I’m at home going through the backlog. But now that you’re talking about four different priority tiers, having them be device-specific sounds like a good plan. Best I can do without a separate tier from smartwatch/KDE Connect/ChromeOS is notify, snooze, and silent - 3 tiers. Pretty sure there are a few apps offering custom ringtones or vibration patterns per app or per notification keyword for further granularity on the phone itself, but for those who already wear a smartwatch (like me) having the separate device do that heavy lifting is a great way to go.
So it won’t improve your life. Way to go.
It did mine, it was asked and I answered.
Besides the other answers, it trivializes them while making you put forth the tiniest effort towards one you might care about while you can discard the rest. The trick with phones isn’t in picking it up to look, but rather on putting it back down.
Glasses.
Now I’m addicted.
I went through a glasses addiction myself as well lol. I found an eye-care clinic where they would cut the lenses and have them ready within 3 hours.
I would go to garage sales, thrift stores, and swap meets to find glasses to put lenses on. They were like $60 for the lenses and I never spent more than $10 on frames.
I ended up with 3 seeing glasses and 4 sun glasses before I realized it was going to be unsustainable to get new lenses for my new prescription every year.
Addicted is a good way to put it. I suffer withdrawal symptoms like dizziness and nausea when I go more than a few waking minutes without my glasses.
I put on glasses once as a kid, now i’m glasses for life!
I got hooked in my mid 20s, and it’s like I can’t imagine how lived without them
Just any kind of glass.
Microscope slides, dildos, windows, bongs, pyrex
A house. My mortgage is cheaper than rent, and now I get to actually address annoyances with my living conditions.
It’s almost 100 years old, and a bit of an fixer upper, but the important stuff is solid. Last summer I invested in proper drainage around the foundation so that I can start making the basement livable. This year I invested in a proper bathroom. Next year it’s a new kitchen. And if time allows I’ll start rebuilding the basement mainly for one extra bed room and an office.
Same, cut my monthly housing cost by almost $1000 two years ago. So many good things have happened as a result as well, because it was a move between regions and opened up alternative employment options not previously available. As a result I also doubled my income.
God I wish my mortgage was cheaper than rent lol.
Hold onto it long enough and it will be eventually. Home ownership is the only real cheat code we have against inflation.
Oh yea 💯
It’s just gonna take a while. My PITI is 3350/month.
Depends on market. In Vancouver existing rentals are controlled until you move, the house sells, or you are reno-evicted. This involves evicting the tenant to “fix up the suite” and then renting it out at a much higher rate.
There is also the move to evict for a " family member" to move in but often this is abused to get low paying tenants out.
New mortgages are much more than existing rent here. As much as renters go through credit checks, I think landlords should too as you don’t want to rent a place where they can’t afford the interest rate increases. Often they cheap out on repairs and usually sees the place being sold or one of the above abuses of the evictions to get a higher paying tenant in.
The market is really tight in places like Vancouver and Toronto. The interest rate hikes will eventually catch up to most renters as properties are moved/sold.
This is a good one. I finally teamed up with family to invest in a house last year. I’ve found a lot of issues that I’ve since fixed, especially with the electrical. There’s still a lot to fix, but I’m elated that I can actually take action to fix stuff.
While renting, my hands were severely tied. The only benefit with renting was that if anything was literally broken, it would be fixed by the landlord, free to me. “Fixed” is subjective, usually done as cheaply as possible, which is often making things less convenient.
Now I can have things fixed correctly, making things more convenient overall for me and my family.
Long term, we’re planning on renovating and adding another kitchen and bathroom, possibly another entrance and I’m considering splitting the HVAC for one portion of the place and almost splitting it into two independent homes that are conjoined.
My mortgage is cheaper than Rest
That doesn’t make any sense. Unless the market at your country is completly broken, that simply does not happen.
Mortgage cheaper than rent here - just outside of Washington DC. (Only true when comparing like for like living spaces, same bedrooms, square feet, etc)
Often rent covers the owner’s mortgage plus their benefit, so yes, it’s easy for your mortgage to be cheaper than rent.
Australia checking in: mortgage repayments are absolutely cheaper than rents. Especially if you bought pre-pandemic.
This only talks about rent. And when rent increases, so does the value of the property, because you can get more money as rents are higher.
If you now consider the amount of work you have to invest into owning property and the associated risk of owning a house or flat, in an ideal market its simply not possible.
And while the housing market is imperfect due to the high burden for entrance, I have never seen a proper calculation where mortage, insurance and maintanance comes out lower than renting.
And, as a matter of fact, it doesnt even in your own example Sydney: https://www.smh.com.au/money/saving/as-costs-soar-is-it-cheaper-to-rent-or-buy-20230407-p5cywp.html
I’m not going to doxx myself by giving the exact address, but my landlady in 2019 wanted to sell the house we were in. She first offered the place to us for $430,000 - which would have been a discount because she wouldn’t have needed an agent etc.
Assuming we had the 20% deposit to borrow $344,000 and taken her up on that offer, our current repayments would have been about $464 per week. Even without the discount, repayments would have been under $500.
Instead, she eventually sold the property and we had to move to a smaller house where we are now paying $650 per week. Going from a 4 bedroom house with a yard to a 3 bedroom townhouse sharing the block with two other residences. No yard. Admittedly, we moved a suburb closer to the CBD.
Take a look at Real estate for a 3+ bedroom house within 10km of any Australian city, you’ll see that $650 is not extravagant by any means.
-
The 20 % deposit has to be taken into the calculation as well.
-
You are completly neglecting insurance.
-
You are negleticing maintanance.
-
You are comparing two different properties.
- The 20% deposit is the entire point. It’s the barrier of entry to home ownership that keeps people renting. Of course I factored it in, it’s why I spoke of a mortgage of $344k and not $430k.
- What does insurance have to do with anything? We are comparing rent to repayments. We have renter’s insurance now. We’d be changing that.
- Are you saying you spend over $100 per week, every week on maintenance?
- True. We’ve downsized from a four bedroom house to a three bedroom townhouse. You’ll just have to take my word for it that 4 bedroom houses in the next suburb go for about the same as the place we have because I’ve already told Lemmy enough about where I live.
-
Bidet, heated mattress pad, shoehorn.
Plus one for shoehorn, underrated and my friends always make fun of me for using one for some reason. Meanwhile I’m standing with my shoes on comfy while they tear their fingers up trying to slide their shoes on
Shout-out to Kiziks. Never tying my shoes again
Literally never “torn my fingers up” while putting on shoes, and I’m the kind that ties them once when I buy them and never again. Either your friends wear iron shoes or this is a really extreme exaggeration.
If you tie your shoes using the “runners knot”, which most sporty shoes are designed for and eliminates heel slip, you will have a hard time getting them on without a shoe horn or having to re-lace them every time.
You won’t find a house in Scandinavia without a shoe horn, it’s fascinating how rare they are in the US and most of Europe
For extra dork points I get on marketed for geriatrics that’s a full meter long so you don’t have to bend down to put your shoes on.
deleted by creator
A memory foam mattress topper. Mine is 8cm (3") thick and an absolute game changer. It goes on top of your existing mattress and under the fitted sheet.
I’m more of a pillow top kind a guy but yes.
Chef’s knife. Mountain bike (a “real” mountainbike) Gaming Laptop
Which knife? I’m still stuck on deciding between expensive Wustoff vs cheap Mercer and boutique Japanese knives.
Except that my cooking is absolutely horrible so I’ll probably go get the cheapest thing anyway
Let me start out by saying that I am by no means an authority on the matter.
First was some generic brand 7" chef’s knife. I think I paid around $40 for it. It did alright for a while, but what I noticed about it was that the ergonomics and fit/finish were (just slightly) lacking. Unrefined edges made it a bit uncomfortable to use.
My next knife was from Zwilling. It’s another standard 7" chef’s knife with the hollow cutouts on the blade. This one was much better quality wise, the fit and finish and balance are all there.
The next one after that is a 5" Chef’s knife (with hollow cutouts) from Wüsthof. This is my current everyday knife, and I like the size of this one much better. I got this one because I really needed something more compact, and it’s been great for mostly everything I use it for right now.
The next knife I want to get is a Nakiri style. Wusthof is sold out of their more affordable line, and the Zwilling one doesn’t have the hollow cuttouts on the blade. The Zwilling brand doesn’t look quite as good as the Wusthof, in my opinion, but it may still function great.
The last thing I’d like to mention is a knife sharpener. When I got my Zwilling, they also threw in this little keychain Wusthof sharpener, and as long as I give my knife a few swipes every couple of times I use it, they stay pretty sharp. Definitely don’t overlook this detail, because even a lower quality knife will benefit greatly from a consistent sharpening routine like that.
Good luck, and I hope that helps. Let me know what you end up going with if you do decide!
Thanks. I don’t know how to sharpen my knives, and I’ll likely go for something under $20 or so. I’ll have to see what I can do to sharpen them
There are two main sharpening angles. 20 degrees is typical american knife. Some overseas chef knived get into 15 degree edges. Lower the degree, the sharper the edge, but the quicker itll dull against bone or stone or use overall. Pay attention to the angle when you buy a sharpener. You can get basic pull through sharpener for cheap, good for starter as the sharpener is set at the angle, just make sure the sharpener angle matches the knife angle, and if it comes with course/fine or whatever, only ever use the fine. The course sharpeners are for when you ding or dent the blade edge and they remove a lot of metal.
If you get into knives and want more, then i would move to a proper sharpening stone with a wedge or jig to hold the angle for you. Thisll let you get a feel for what angle to hold the knife at. After a while you can freehand without the wedge or jig.
Dont go too high dollar on your first knife, an 800$ japanese knife is incredible but the difference is not all that apparent to you from a 40$ knife and its better to fuck up a cheaper one learning to use and sharpen it, hence i recommend victorinox as the starter knife (15 degree on most of those). Everyones hands are different so what works for one person doesn’t fit everyone. Typically a chefs knife will do what most people want, 8" to 10" to start out, pick your favorite knife out of your cheapo kohls knife block and note its shape and length and go from there, get a single decent knife dont get a high dollar block of them as you wont use most of those. Dont overthink it or worry about it
Thanks, I’d like a 20cm long (8 inches) chef’s knife. I’ll have a look at Victorinox.
Thanks for the advice around sharpening, I assumed everyone used sharpening blocks but apparently not. I’ll keep the degrees in mind.
Vinctorinox is generally accepted as the best “starter” brand, and is the end game for a lot of people
Thanks
deleted by creator
Noise cancelling earphones.
Oh man. Just not having to listen to my dishwasher, clothes machines or vacuum cleaner run their mouths while they’re in service is live improvening.
That’s no way to talk about the women in your family /s
deleted by creator
Enough money to pay my bills and also invest in me.
My PC, which allowed me to do more than 2000 custom ROM builds.
Curious, custom rom builds for…?
Poco X3 NFC
Welder a number of years back. Led to a whole ass career change lol
Led to a whole ass-career change lol
Per XKCD https://xkcd.com/37/
The little known trade of anal welding
there is a cure for incontinence and all those people wearing adult diapers are simply cowards
Anything that takes away shitty chores. People take washing machines for granted these days, but a decent dishwasher is a godsend. Modern ones don’t need anything more than a basic scrape of the dishes as “prep” and loading it before bed to then wake up to a load of sparkling clean dishes is amazing.
In a similar vein we’ve just got a robot vacuum cleaner that we’ve set to run every night. The amount of dog fur in its bin every morning is eye opening, and other than for the stairs there’s almost no need to do vacuuming ourselves now.
Absolutely in favor of any tech that will make life easier. I hated doing dishes every night and the dishwasher in the house I’m renting is broken. I bought a countertop dishwasher called ICUIRE which does not need to be hooked to a water source. I ran that damn thing every day, and not only do I use less water and electricity but I can recycle the grey water into the garden.
I wish I had known about this when I lived in a place without a dishwasher! I tried an external dishwasher but it was a pain to hookup to the sink every time and the capacity wasn’t big enough make the hassle worthwhile.
It definitely can be done Due to the room and the constraints I had. I built it to be self contained. Also took steps to make sure it would not flood or spill over onto the floor. I had a mini washer in my apartment and I had a problem with it backing up into the sink. I am all about building necessities to avoid human contact.
You need to keep the floor clear and empty its bin, sure, but it’s way less effort than actually vacuuming. We’ve only had it for a couple of weeks but have got into the habit of doing a quick run around picking up toys and other obstacles before we go to bed (though I did specifically buy a model that can avoid those things).
Huh, we’ve never had to do that. Do you have a relatively big home or a heavy-shedding pet?
Synology NAS (basically a hard drive always connected to the home network and internet) - has been amazing for auto-backing-up photos from the family phones and for running Plex run my own personal streaming service for the whole family around the world. Has been great for file transfer too. I can easily move files between my phone, PC, Steam Deck, etc and all the USB memory sticks I had have been sitting in a drawer ever since.
Exercise compression thermals - wear these is super comfortable and really warm. I wear them constantly at home and can have the heating off almost all winter (UK). Saves tons of energy and money.
Electric blanket - another great low energy purchase for relaxing under when watching TV or warming up the bed before sleeping. Gets super hot while hardly using any energy at all.
Split unit air con installation - this was expensive and I thought it would be unnecessary in the UK, but it seems to be used more and more every summer as we get more heatwaves and summers are becoming unbearable.
Safety razors - I have really thick facial hair and the multi-blade razors from big name brands would dull really quickly and cause tons of shaving rash. These razors are sharper, last longer, are recyclable and much better for my skin.
Liquid ink refillable rollerball pens - I tried fountain pens after seeing the online communities that are crazy about them, and really didn’t like them. I found rollerball pens I like that take fountain pen ink and have been super happy with them. I write a lot at work and this has gotten rid of the plastic waste of throwing away used disposable ballpoint refills every couple of weeks.
Hitbox controller - I’ve been playing Street Fighter 6 since release and I made a leverless controller box myself and I’ve loved using it to play SF6. Managed to make it for one third the price of what these things sell for and completely customised it.
I really need to finish building my NAS. You just reminded me of that.
And the other tips are good as well. Thanks.
More info on the homemade controller?
My DIY controller made from scratch. It has a built in USB c hub so when I use it with the Steam Deck I can connect the charger cable to the controller. If someone is playing locally with me their controller just plugs into the side of mine and works with the Steam Deck. Made the footprint as small as I could. It’s 21 x 15.3 x 3.6 cm Seimitsu buttons. Raspberry pi controller. 5 additional side buttons for navigation and shortcuts.
I made this post as well: https://lemm.ee/post/9700155
The whole collection: https://i.imgur.com/nB1Mfa9.png
There’s a community for this but it’s pretty dead: https://lemmy.world/c/arcadesticks
I can make a detailed guide if anyone is interested. And I’m looking to sell the black and white controller with the integrated hub. Maybe even the one with the keyboard buttons if I can fix the firmware annoyance in it.
Yes please
See above comment
Congrats fellow hitbox user. Btw the Norelco one blade works better on my thick facial hair than a straight Razer does with less hassle and they are pretty cheap to try out. I’m still debating that split ac for the upstairs office…
2 years ago I bought an electric mattress pad. My wife gave me a hard time about it at first, didn’t think we’d ever use it.
But wow. Nothing better than climbing into a preheated bed on a cold night. I always set it to high about 20 minutes before we actually go to bed, then turn it down to the lowest setting. When it’s cold out, every single time we get into bed, we both let out a sigh of comfort. Can’t recommend it enough.
A bidet spray…
Think of it like a kitchen faucet spray for your ass, after taking a dump…
But otherwise, take an empty disc top shampoo container and use it .
