HOME SERVER NOTES
=================

Sometime around Christmas last year, I 
wrote about my experiences setting up 
a Nextcloud server. I shut that server 
down after learning that Nextcloud had 
scanned for non-updated servers and 
reported them to various agencies.[1] 
I don't think it's wise to run an 
out-of-date server, but I disagree 
completely with Nextcloud's decision 
and I no longer trust them to respect 
my privacy.

Since then, I've been making use of 
BlackBerry Desktop to sync my work 
laptop and my phone (an old Bold 9900) 
offline (via bluetooth). That 
definitely seems like the most secure 
approach. But I am still interested in 
setting up a personal server to store 
my calendar, contacts, notes, and 
files, and to facilitate small-scale 
private communications. That server 
will be more important if/when I have 
to 'upgrade' my phone.

A replacement for those Nextcloud 
services is shaping up. My replacement 
server is a Raspberry Pi Zero (I was 
originally using a Zero W, but 
experienced VOIP latency issues, 
described below) running a 'default' 
Raspbian Lite installation.

Here is the software I am using to 
replace the Nextcloud functions:

*File storage -- WebDav

*Calendar and contacts -- Radicale

*Notes -- Joplin (which makes use of 
WebDav)

*IM -- Prosody (XMPP)

*Private Phone Network -- Asterisk

Setup:

Several of the instruction pages below 
might seem to be out of date, but they 
worked with my completely updated 
version of raspian-stretch-lite.

WebDav. It's amazingly responsive and 
works well with my laptop. On the 
downside, I have not found an open 
source client for Android and the 
Ghost Commander plugin no longer 
works. If you know of one, get in 
touch. I followed these instructions 
to install:

https://www.howtoforge.com/tutorial/how-to-install-webdav-with-lighttpd-on-debian-jessie/

Radicale. I installed version 1.1 from 
the repository rather than the more up 
to date version available through 
python-pip, which wouldn't work on my 
Pi Zero. Everything has gone without a 
hitch so far. Installation 
instructions are here:

https://jonathantutorial.blogspot.com/2014/10/how-to-set-up-radicale.html

Joplin. It allows you to store your 
notes on your WebDav server. Configure 
the Joplin client to sync the notes to 
a subdirectory in your webdav folder. 
There is an option to encrypt the 
files as well.

Prosody. I'm already running an XMPP 
server for circumlunar.space. Prosody 
is simple to set up and runs 
flawlessly. The official documentation 
is great, which I might say is a 
rarity among open source projects, and 
something to be commended. 

Asterisk was fairly simple to set up. 
I initially found that I was 
experiencing significant latency, but 
it was my own fault. Sometimes, I 
ignore recommendations when I don't 
like them. In this case, the solution 
was to go with wired connections all 
the way. WiFi is your enemy with VOIP. 
Check out this old (and super simple) 
configuration guide:

https://web.archive.org/web/20100612193611/http://www.beardy.se/2010/05/30/an-introduction-to-asterisk-the-open-source-telephony-project

The only change I made was to disable 
all codecs in /etc/asterisk/sip.conf 
prior to enabling them, as follows 
(this is the head, or beginning, of 
the file):

[general]
context=incoming

disallow=all
allow=ulaw
allow=alaw
allow=gsm

Doing this seems to have eliminated 
some static. I don't really understand 
why, but somebody, somewhere 
recommended it.



[1] Here's the reddit thread through 
    which I learned about this issue:

    https://www.reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/5ybmf1/nextcloud_scanning_peoples_owncloud_and_nextcloud/
    
    You can read Nextcloud's 
    assessment of what happened here:

    https://nextcloud.com/blog/nextcloud-releases-security-scanner-to-help-protect-private-clouds/