Networking from first principles to production: DNS, DHCP, subnets, VLANs, VPNs and reverse proxies, demonstrated in the lab.
How to Run Pi-hole in Docker (DNS Ad Blocking with Docker Compose) If you are already running Docker on your server, putting Pi-hole in a container is the obvious choice. Your DNS service gets the same isolation, portability, and reproducibility as every other service in your stack. You can version control the compose file, blow
How to Run Pi-hole in Docker (Complete Guide) Read More »
How to Install Pi-hole on Ubuntu 24.04 (Network-Wide Ad Blocking Without a Pi) Most Pi-hole guides assume you are running a Raspberry Pi. That is where the name comes from, and it is a perfectly good deployment target. But plenty of people have an Ubuntu server already running in their homelab, or a spare mini
How to Install Pi-hole on Ubuntu 24.04 Read More »
How to Install Tailscale on Linux (Zero-Config VPN for Your Homelab) I have spent more hours than I care to admit configuring WireGuard tunnels by hand, generating key pairs, managing peer configs across devices, and debugging firewall rules when something stops working after a kernel update. Tailscale does the same job in about two minutes:
How to Install Tailscale on Linux (Zero-Config VPN) Read More »
The docker-compose.yml used in this guide (copy-paste ready). Every Homelab Needs a Front Door If you are running more than one web-facing service in your homelab, you have probably hit the same wall everyone does. Nextcloud is on port 8080, Vaultwarden is on port 8081, Uptime Kuma is on port 3001, and you are typing
How to Install Nginx Proxy Manager with Docker (2026 Guide) Read More »
Why WireGuard Changed Everything I ran OpenVPN for years. It worked, most of the time, but the configuration was a maze of certificates, TLS keys, and config files that took an afternoon to set up and broke in ways that were never obvious. When I switched to WireGuard, the entire server config was 15 lines.
How to Set Up WireGuard VPN on Ubuntu 24.04 Read More »
Before I set up proper internal DNS, DuckDNS was the glue holding my remote access together. I had a Raspberry Pi running a handful of services at home, a residential IP address that changed every few days, and no interest in paying for a static IP from my ISP. DuckDNS solved the problem in about
How to Set Up DuckDNS for Free Dynamic DNS (Raspberry Pi and Linux) Read More »
It was the afternoon of November 18, 2025, and a large part of the internet went dark at once. Spotify was down. ChatGPT was offline. Even Trump’s Truth Social had gone silent. Anything published through Cloudflare, including self-hosted services exposed with Cloudflare Tunnels, was effectively offline. Not because the servers behind it had failed, but
When Hyperscalers Fail: What Three Major Outages Taught Us About Internet Resilience Read More »
Calculate subnet masks, CIDR notation, wildcard masks, and host ranges in seconds. Built for network engineers, system administrators, and anyone configuring IP networks. From the field: I built this because I got tired of doing subnet maths in my head during planning sessions. Whether I am designing an Azure VNet or segmenting my homelab, having
Free IP Subnet Calculator: CIDR, Subnet Masks & Network Planning Read More »
And Why You Should Try It in Your Homelab with Twingate 👋 The Old Way: VPNs and Big Doors For years, remote access meant one thing: a VPN. You logged in once, and suddenly your laptop could see everything on the network. That worked fine when: • Everyone sat in the same office. • The
What Is Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA)? Homelab Guide Read More »
We all know that one corner in the house where cables run wild, blinking lights dazzle in the dark, and airflow is barely a thought. For me, that corner was the hallway: where the internet connection enters, access points are fed, Smart Home hubs live, and the rack got dirtier by the week. This week
DIY Lab Rax 10-Inch 5U: Homelab Rack Build with 3D Printing Read More »
