I haven’t written in a long time. I wanted to update my current computer systems since I am not running Debian anymore. Debian ran great for me, the only reason I left is because I am running mythtv-backend on my server and Ubuntu has better support for mythtv-backend.
Server Ubuntu 24.10
Upgraded from 20.04LTS to 22.04LTS to 24.04LTS then 24.10. LTS=long term support version of Ubuntu.
I should have stayed on 24.04 LTS version for better support of TV video capture hardware. I hope to stay on 24.10 until 26.04 LTS becomes available. I did image my 20.04 installation before upgrade with Clonezilla (10/10 stars). I failed to update my wordpress, nextcloud, ? other services at 22.04 before upgrading to 24.04. Sometimes mysql database schemas change between versions and need to be updated before the next upgrade. I failed to upgrade mythtv at 22.04 and my 20.04 database was incompatible with mythtv at 24.04. I could have rolled back to my 20.04 image and started over, however I decided to delete my mythtv database and start with a clean mythtv database for 24.04. This meant all my recorded and saved tv shows would not be seen and stored in the new database, which I was ok with. I deleted the old tv recordings off of my hard drive.
My favorite Software and Services Installed on my Server ranked from most needed/used to least used.
- Nextcloud: file server, contact list server, calendar server, notes server, photos, bookmarks, and an online email reader that connects to my email server. All of this is stored in the “cloud” on my server and I have access to my files anywhere I travel. I just scratching the surface of what Nextcloud can do. I deserves it’s own post.
- File server with NFS, WebDAV, and SMB (samba) protocols. Allows connections of all my computers to the larger storage on my server (backups and media files). I also have FTP (proftpd) service needed by WordPress for it’s upgrades.
- MythTV-backend: Think of TIVO. The backend stores my over the air antenna television recordings for playback on my network or over the internet. I can record 4 channels at the same time. I do not watch TV, I do this for my wife.
- Email server running on Postfix and dovecott software. I am unable to create an unlimited number of email accounts and can host multiple domains. I would only recommend running your own server if you are a true computer nerd and enjoy linux and the command line. It is a difficult and time consuming to set up, however very stable and I get way less spam than my yahoo and gmail accounts.
- Database Mysql (MariaDB) server. A fast database is needed for email, nextcloud, and wordpress web server hosting. I use phpMyAdmin to interact with my databases.
- Apache2: web server for displaying file contents on the internet
- WordPress: content management system for the creation and management of a blog and website
Software on my server
- Webmin: monitor and configure your server from a web browser.
- rsync: used for backing up computers
- ssh server: allows encrypted remote access to the server for running commands from the terminal. I do not leave a monitor attached to my server.
- Python for running automated scripts.
- Certbot: manages and creates SSL security certificates from “Let’s Encrypt”
- byobu: terminal add on for multiple tabs
- midnight commander: terminal file browser