# State of the Cloud

_Published: September 21, 2022_

As promised, this post is a followup to my previous post on
the [state of my homelab](/blog/state-of-the-homelab-2022-09.html).

## My Approach to the Cloud

Before listing off hosts, I thought it'd be worth a discussion of
how I approach "the cloud". I'll start off by apologizing for
using the word "cloud" so much--it does feel buzzwordy
but it's significantly shorter than "services hosted by cloud providers".

In general, I prefer to self host my own services, and have been since
[2020](/blog/self-hosted.html). I self host because:

- It's a great learning opportunity
- I prefer controlling my data
- I feel it's important to maintain some semblance of an internet
 where anyone can run their own node (not just big companies).

There are, however, pragmatic limitations. I don't own the hardware
in a rack in the datacenter because I simply have no need for that
kind of compute power. Likewise, I don't run the services off of my
home network because most internet providers explicitly disallow it
in their terms of service. So "self hosting" is more about running
software on a VM in "the cloud" and minimizing my reliance on hosted
services.

## alexkarle.com

The server hosting this site is a base-tier VM (1GB RAM/1 CPU) from
[OpenBSD.Amsterdam](https://openbsd.amsterdam/). It's reasonably
priced at 60 euros/yr (Linode has the same host spec for $60/yr),
especially when you consider the fact that 10-15 of those are donated
to the OpenBSD foundation.

Ultimately I chose it because:

1. It's the only service I know running OpenBSD VMs on OpenBSD servers
  and that's just plain cool. This really has nothing to do with
  security concerns, I just appreciate the fact that _someone_ is
  doing it (and that they donate to the OpenBSD foundation!)
2. It's so small scale that you end up emailing a real live human to
  register and for support which has been really pleasant (and said human
  is also super cool and gives [conference talks about the
  setup](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TuWCR9X-wY)--thanks
  Mischa if you're reading this!)
3. They [publish their scripts](https://git.high5.nl/) used to provision
  and deploy VMs, which is also really cool (have I said "cool"
  enough?)

I've been using them for a little over a year now and am a happy
renewing customer. My only qualm has been that, being in Amsterdam,
the latency from Boston is noticeable.

I can't say how well it would take load, since I've never had any
real traffic spikes. If my site got uber-popular I'd re-evaluate the
Acme theme first and then maybe make sure the VM is doing OK :)

As it says on the [homepage](/), this server hosts:

- This blog / related archives (like jam setlists)
- [https://euchre.live]
- [My gopherhole](gopher://alexkarle.com)
- [Several git projects](https://git.alexkarle.com)
- Email -- I use the akarle.com domain for outbound mail from
`cron` so I don't have to ssh in to check if my TLS cert renewal
failed (without tarninshing my personal alexkarle.com reputation)
- The [soju](https://soju.im) IRC bouncer

This is the second iteration of alexkarle.com, the first being on
Linode (running the same software). Migrating was manual, and I wish
I blogged about it at the time--I'm sure I learned something in the
process. Having been running for 1+ years now, the minutiae of the
configs escape me a bit (although I of course [track them privately
in git](/blog/use-git.html)).

## garbash.com

Garbash, the [tilde that I started with a friend](/blog/starting-a-tilde.html),
runs on Linode on a base $5/mo shared 1CPU/1RAM VM. It's running
OpenBSD since booting a new Linux VM on Linode is just too dang
easy (I really enjoy their developer experience!) and we needed
a challenge.

Linode has treated me really well over the past few years, and I
would use them for any professional work if I could (I've never
worked somewhere early-stage enough to dictate the cloud provider).

I chose them originally because I wanted a hosting provider that wasn't
one of the big three (Amazon, Google, Microsoft). Since self hosting
is about exercising my freedoms, it feels backwards to do it on the
servers of some of the largest tech monopolies.

The tilde project includes hosting almost all the same services
(email, wireguard, web, git, etc) as alexkarle.com.

## Looking Forward

Every once and a while I kick around the idea of reducing my
"sysadmin debt" and moving from self-hosted to "foss-hosted". It's
still really important to me to stay indie and support small
hosting providers, but I feel like a lot of the learning took
place in the first year and has left me with only maintenance
(and small bills to pay).

I've been a paying subscriber to [Sourcehut](https://sourcehut.org)
for almost 3 years now and in that time they've released
several projects that would alleviate some load:

- [chat.sr.ht](https://chat.sr.ht) would save me from hosting soju
 (there is the real concern about someone having my personal chat
 logs, but realistically I mostly lurk on IRC and all the channels
 I'm in are public anyways--no private dms occurring to be worried
 about and for those I could always connect directly/avoid the
 bouncer).
- [sourcehut pages](https://srht.site) would easily host my site
 (it actually [already does](https://akarle.srht.site) in my
 experimenting with foss-hosted)
- Of course their [git hosting](https://git.sr.ht), which I already
 use (and link to in blog posts since it has whole file blobs at
 every commit unlike my `stagit(1)` setup; I don't want dead links
 in posts!)

More problematic would be finding a home for euchre.live. Since
it requires a running Perl backend, finding hosting might be a challenge.
That said, the project hasn't seen much love since I started seeing
my family for dinner and games in person (after COVID concerns
became lesser), so I may sunset it soon.

Lastly, my gopherhole would have to find a new home. [SDF](https://sdf.org)
is a good candidate since it has [free Gopher hosting](https://gopher.club),
but I would lose my personal domain and, unless I'm missing something,
it's a stretch to call SDF "foss" since most of their code is proprietary
(no shade on the tilde--the community is incredible and it's amazing
to have lasted 35 years).

All things considered, the 5-10 minutes I spend per month
`syspatch(8)`-ing my servers is worth the freedoms that come
with root access and being able to run the software I want under
my own domain name, at least for now. If and when I need to migrate
hosting providers, I may feel differently about setting it all up
again a third time.

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