Homelab
Why I Homelab
I think homelabbing is just a great way to get into IT and a great way to keep skills sharp or develop new ones. I got started with homelabbing like many people do, a Minecraft server running off my own desktop as a kid. From that Minecraft server I moved onto a Raspberry Pi that ran OwnCloud and OpenVPN.
When I interviewed for my first IT position, a Linux Admin position I was woefully underqualified for, I hit it off with their Security lead who happened to be standing up OpenVPN as a solution and we had a great conversation about the struggles of learning the tool. Needless to say I did not get that job but they did end up calling me back a couple months later for a helpdesk/junior admin position that I accepted.
Homelabbing is what got me into the field and I encourage anyone who asks me about getting into IT to take a crack at it. You don’t need an entire rack of servers, you don’t need expensive disk arrays, a Pi is more than enough to get started down the IT road and to learn a couple new things on.
The Environment
Hardware
| Hardware | Purpose |
|---|---|
| R220 | OPNSense |
| R320 | Backups NAS |
| R620 | XCP-NG |
| R510 | Media NAS |
| Catalyst-4948 |
Service List
- Active Directory
- For central authentication for all services and GPO
- Windows DNS
- Windows DHCP
- Windows Enterprise CA
- Testing ideas and the ability to sign local scripts
- Nextcloud
- Docker
- Gitea
- Docker
- TheLounge
- Docker
- HTTPD
- Basic homepage for https://dev0.sh
- Docker
- Linx
- For personal code sharing/file uploads
- Docker
- Ansible
- CFM on Linux hosts mostly
- 3CX
- I run a “work line” over this since we all went WFH and I didn’t want to give out my cell
- voip.ms is my DID provider
- Homebridge
- My smart home is based around Apple and Siri
- TrueNas
- I run 2 hosts, one for media and the other for backups/shares (the cost worked out better to have 2 hosts)
- OpenWrt
- My Cisco WRT series router runs this as my main AP