My Default Apps at the End of 2023

Quick and dirty! Here’s all the stuff I can think of…

Mail Client: Apple Mail and Thunderbird
Mail Server: Fastmail
Notes: Apple Notes
To-Do: Nothing
iPhone Photo Shooting: iOS Camera
iPhone Photo Backup: Nextcloud
Photo Management: Apple Phones (on iPhone), On1 on MacOS
Calendar: Apple Calendar
Cloud File Storage: Nextcloud
RSS: TinyTinyRSS
Contacts: Apple Contacts
Browser: Firefox
Chat: iMessage
Bookmarks: Firefox
Homepage/News: Protopage
Music: Apple Music (The app, not the service)
Podcasts: Overcast
Password Management: KeePassXC

Other Default Apps and Devices:

Mastodon Client: Mono
eReader: Kindle Oasis
Digital Audio Workstation (DAW): AVID Pro Tools
Video Editing (NLE): Davinci Resolve
Linux Distribution: Debian (Bookworm)
Firewall: OpnSense (PC Engines APU4)
VPN Platform: Wireguard
Storage System: ZFS (on Debian)
Virtual Machines: KVM/qemu
Containers: Podman
Backup Service: Crashplan Pro
ZFS Data Replication: Syncoid (Sanoid)
Non-Web File Syncing: Syncthing
Home Automation: Home Assistant (Zigbee and WiFi for devices, with MQTT)
Weather Station: WeeWx
‘Serious’ Camera: OM Digital Solutions OM-1 (Micro Four Thirds)

RSyslog, ZFS, and Storing logs based on the source in my HomeLab

There are many ways to store syslog data, and nearly all of them are better than what I am outlining here. If you’re looking to learn how to deal with syslog at scale, take a look at Graylog, or the Elk Stack or some other similar tool. There are many free and/or open source options to do this. Many of which I’ve setup and used for my employers.

For me though, I’m not looking to load big piles of data into some database and keep it stored for long periods, automatically indexed and cataloged. I don’t need that.

Instead, I’d like to gather logs from a handful of devices, store them as flat files based on the date, and then just throw them away after a month.… Click here to read more!

Libresonic on Centos 7 with SSL

I’ve been a happy iTunes Match user since the service was introduced. I have a large music collection and I don’t always want to dedicate the required amount of iPhone and computer storage to keeping it available all the time on all my devices. iTunes Match lets Apple deal with storing the whole thing and allows me to just download what I want on a given device or stream music I own to any device I’d like. It’s been $25/year well spent.

That being said, with streaming music plans taking over the market, I can’t imagine Apple’s going to want to offer this service forever, plus I prefer to self-host as much of my digital needs as possible.… Click here to read more!