pibox-os VS coolify

About my business? Sure! It's at https://kubesail.com and we sell our hardware at https://pibox.io :)

Our best feature is that the website will detect if you're on the same network as your machine and if so, offer "local" links instead of remotely proxied ones. That way non-technical users dont need anything fancy. On top of that, the "local" urls still get valid HTTPS certs for free, so non-technical users dont get any scary browser warnings.

We started out as a way to make self-hosting easier for corporations, but the users who joined our community were mostly home-hosters, so we leaned into that! Jellyfin is now our most popular app.

I built a small business around this idea (particularly your last sentence about it evolving quickly), so I can’t not promote https://KubeSail.com and our hardware at https://pibox.io

That said, I use an old workstation as my home router and server. It’s worth the power bills in saved subscription cost alone. Much more relevant is how much of my time I spend on it!

We make tiny Linux servers packed with real devops tools (but also sporting a somewhat-easy-ish-to-use UI) for home-hosting and self-teaching: https://pibox.io - works great with Jellyfin!

I am really loving my https://pibox.io, it might fit the bill if you can get your hands on one. A raspberry pi 4 should be okay too with the usb 3, it just might be not as neat

I do but my side business doesn’t make 6 figures! Curious why you don’t think focusing on growing that isn’t a better path forward. Obligatory link to said side business: https://pibox.io

I saw solutions like https://pibox.io/ which is interesting, maybe ticking all the boxes, but all the versions are sold out. While I am waiting for them to be back to stock, have anyone used it and what is your thought? Does it work for my need? What is the alternatives?

I watched a video about OpenMediaVault and I don't like three things about it. Firstly the user interface doesn't look as user friendly as in TrueNAS for example, secondly the guy in the video I watched said there is no RAID with OpenMediaVault and thirdly the cheapest Raspberry Pi 4 Modell B, 8 GB costs around 160 USD where I live which is much more than I thought. There are Kits like the PiBox but they are very expensive too.

I am quite happy with pibox. It's only two 2.5" drives, but they are also working on a 5x3.5" version.

And Pibox from Rasperry pi too - https://pibox.io

I am using the pibox as a NAS, but that might be an overkill for you.

With a serverful approach, you can avoid these drawbacks, and the main challenge lies in selecting the platform that aligns with your requirements. Options may include AWS, Render, DigitalOcean, and others. While VPS is also an option, it's generally not recommended due to the significant setup and maintenance overhead involved (logging, monitoring, CI/CD pipelines, etc.). However, you can make your life easier by leveraging tools like Coolify that help managing your VPS.

Heroku and similar providers can simplify the server management issues, but you can use something much better that can combine both cost efficiency and ease of deployment—Coolify:

> VPSs being “easy to manage” is a strong option full of assumptions.

There are definitely many footguns with managing a VPS but I think the threshold to get vaguely competent with a VPS is not really that far off with getting familiar with the average cloud platform - which comes with its own dangers, like the near-total inability to put an upward cap on fees that that person found out with Netlify recently.

Having a $5 VPS and knowing it's never going to cost your more than $5 might balance out a lot of things on the other side for a lot of people.

(And, as a bonus, it comes with the benefit of having a better idea of what is going on on the actual computer which is running your code.)

Platforms like https://coolify.io/ (which I have not tried, but looks interesting) seem to give you some of the abstractions that you get in cloud platforms to save you having to mess with too much low level stuff and become an expert in a billion separate systems.

If you have Debian with automatic updates that does most of the heavy lifting for you. The hardest problem I have is resisting the temptation to just install everything, because the cost to do it is capped at my VPS monthly fee.

So yep, it comes with a lot of assumptions. But so does everything!

https://coolify.io/ might be worth a look

The modern iteration of these tools has taken the developer experience learnings from the Platform as a Service (PaaS) category, and will bring them to your own VM, giving you your own personal PaaS. Example of this include Dokku, Coolify, Caprover, Cloud66 and many more!