UniFi in a Home Lab: Worth the Tax?
UniFi costs more than an OPNsense router with cheap switches and APs. Here is what the premium buys, what it takes away, and the middle path most labs want.
Tag: networking
All the articles with the tag "networking".
Keycloak vs Authentik vs Authelia
Keycloak, Authentik and Authelia compared on realms, LDAP and AD federation, SAML, OIDC, clustering and RAM, with Compose files and a pick for each use case.
Firewall Rule Audit: Find the Dead Rules
Find unused firewall rules on a Linux box with nftables counters, then retire them safely with a snapshot-and-diff routine, a jq script, and a systemd timer.
IoT VLANs That Don't Break Chromecast
Put smart plugs and TVs on an IoT VLAN, then fix Chromecast, AirPlay and Sonos discovery with an mDNS reflector and the right firewall rules. Configs included.
Cloud Gaming Latency: It's Not Just Ping
Ping is one stage of seven in a game stream's latency chain. Learn what else adds milliseconds, how to measure each stage, and which fixes pay off first.
Split-Horizon DNS for a Home Lab VPN
Make jellyfin.home.example.com resolve to a LAN IP at home and over WireGuard or Tailscale, and to your public IP elsewhere. Unbound and AdGuard Home configs.
Home Lab Threat Model: What's Exposed
Mass scanners find a new home lab IP within hours. Audit what the internet can reach, from UPnP to Docker ports to IPv6, then build a threat model that fits.
Catch Your Self-Hosted Apps Phoning Home
Self-hosted is not silent. Audit outbound calls with DNS query logs, watch live connections, block egress with Docker networks, then flip telemetry opt-outs.
Network Namespaces by Hand, No Docker
Rebuild Docker's bridge network with ip netns, veth pairs, a Linux bridge and nftables NAT. Six iproute2 commands, three nft rules, and a 2 AM debugging edge.
VLAN Trunking Gotchas Nobody Warns You
VLAN configured but traffic still breaks? Native VLAN mismatches, PVID traps on cheap switches, Proxmox bridge gotchas, and Docker macvlan fixes, with commands.
OPNsense Multi-WAN Failover Guide
Configure OPNsense gateway groups for WAN failover and load balancing, then layer policy-based routing so specific hosts or VLANs use a chosen WAN link.
CrowdSec Across a Home Lab: One Brain
One central CrowdSec LAPI, remote log-parsing agents, and bouncers on every box, so an SSH brute-force on one server gets blocked everywhere else too.