Setting up a website - ERE style

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guitarplayer
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by guitarplayer »

Great, thanks! Leapfrogging to the newest thanks to you @mF. I haven't started this yet but have now installed Qarto+its VSC plugin.

white belt
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by white belt »

I'm currently in the process of doing this. I have some software development experience, but not much web development. I played around with Quarto a little bit and it seems pretty straightforward. I'm looking at either GitLab or Cloudflare Pages to host for free because GitHub doesn't allow hosting for business purposes. Someday, I want to self-host on a Raspberry Pi or similar like Low Tech magazine does, but for now I just need to get a website (along with a million other things) up and running for my business.

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mountainFrugal
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by mountainFrugal »

I thought the discussion on the image dithering on the Low Tech site was brilliant. Dithering the images meets the design aesthetic and the problem with images being large data hogs for websites. https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/about.html

You can render the site using Quarto and then only push the rendered _site directory to the remote repository host.

AxelHeyst
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by AxelHeyst »

I'm too much of a tech muggle atm to know if this has already been covered in this thread, but Derek Siver's Tech Independence instruction set seems relevant to this discussion. He talks about it in some length near the beginning of his latest interview with Tim Ferriss.
sivers wrote:Like knowing how to drive or make your own food, so you’re not dependent on taxis or restaurants, it’s very useful to know how to set up your own tech services, to break dependence on the cloud.

Here are my step-by-step instructions on how to set up your own server and services.
All of my stuff is in the cloud and requires zero technical knowledge (and costs money). Switching over to something like this is one of my winter 2024 projects so I'll come back to this thread thenabouts. Do any of you savvy people have thoughts on his post?

(also just posting 'cool minimalist website' for inspiration: https://100r.co/site/home.html I got on to these people from @crusader. They live on a boat and make art and games and are anarchists I think. What's not to love?)
Last edited by AxelHeyst on Fri Apr 21, 2023 12:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by jacob »

AxelHeyst wrote:
Fri Apr 21, 2023 11:58 am
I'm too much of a tech muggle atm to know if this has already been covered in this thread, but Derek Siver's Tech Independence instruction set seems relevant to this discussion. He talks about it in some length near the beginning of his latest interview with Tim Ferriss.
Oooh cool! FWIW, the ERE site runs on something similar using a virtual server on DigitalOcean except I'm not the admin or one who set it up (another forumite is).

On a related note, is anyone familiar with the tildeverse?

One of the projects sitting behind me is a [mostly] portable system based on 2000-2010 hardware that runs on 12V and solar and has the ability to cascade all the way down to AA battery power. I just need to figure out how to recondition a somewhat dead battery that I extracted from a weed whacker to complete the setup. For my next website (not ERE1) I would like to use that to run a site similar to LowTech magazine's.

mathiverse
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by mathiverse »

AxelHeyst wrote:
Fri Apr 21, 2023 11:58 am
All of my stuff is in the cloud and requires zero technical knowledge (and costs money). Switching over to something like this is one of my winter 2024 projects so I'll come back to this thread thenabouts. Do any of you savvy people have thoughts on his post?
Using the linked instructions, your site remains on the cloud. Depending on how your site was initially set up, the real change is that you are one abstraction level closer to "not the cloud." However, you are still firmly cloud based. Instruction 3 in the "Create your server" section even points this out: "Click “Cloud Compute” (NOT “Optimized Cloud Compute”)."

Wouldn't avoiding the cloud require having your own server (eg any physical computer) at home that you connect to the internet, run 24/7, and host your website on?

ETA: I saw your edit that there is a further distinction between Big Cloud vs cloud in general. That basically answers my question: the issue was with using terminology differently. Cloud to me = servers maintained by others in data centers I don't own. Cloud in your usage = Big Cloud = biggest hosting providers who make extra claims of ownership on your data while providing hosting

Also, FWIW, I think the idea is neat too. Being fully off cloud and having everyone know how to do that would be great. I can see how moving to site hosting that makes fewer claims on your data is a good step in the direction.
Last edited by mathiverse on Fri Apr 21, 2023 12:32 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by AxelHeyst »

@mathiverse Yes, I think his main thing was to avoid cloud services where one way or another the Company owns/controls your data. But in his interview he briefly mentions how you could make your server not even kind of cloud based, put the server in your closet etc. eta: aka he makes a distinction between Big Cloud and just 'the cloud'.
Last edited by AxelHeyst on Fri Apr 21, 2023 12:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by jacob »

mathiverse wrote:
Fri Apr 21, 2023 12:12 pm
Wouldn't avoiding the cloud require having your own server (eg any physical computer) at home that you connect to the internet, run 24/7, and host your website on?
Noob question: How flexible are standard retail internet connections (e.g. cheap ass comcast subscription) in terms of opening ports? Can you in principle open any port you want or do ISPs "unhelpfully" block certain ports unless you're on an advanced $$$-plan? Or ... given that one is already uploading and downloading from the interwebs, a server basically uses the exact same ports as a browser anyway, perhaps my question is "not even wrong".

mathiverse
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by mathiverse »

I don't think that website hosting companies like Vultr, GoDaddy, etc, have a significantly different amount of control and access to your data than Wordpress, Bloggr, Squarespace, Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, etc. Am I mistaken about that? They both have theoretical access (eg can use the superuser to access your unencrypted info, have physical control of the hardware and hard drive, can give accessible data to law enforcement, if asked, etc).
Last edited by mathiverse on Fri Apr 21, 2023 12:28 pm, edited 3 times in total.

theanimal
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by theanimal »

He also made the point in the podcast that the best solution would be to get an old Lenovo T400 laptop and put that in your closet and use that as your own personal server. That way you would be fully off the cloud. He posted the instructions online as an easy copy paste method for people to gain more autonomy of their data, have their own server and sever ties with the big cloud databases (Google, Microsoft etc.)
I don't think that website hosting companies like Vultr, GoDaddy, etc, have a significantly different amount of control and access to your data than Wordpress, Bloggr, Squarespace, Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, etc. Am I mistaken about that? They both have theoretical access (eg can use the superuser to access your info, have physical control of the hardware and hard drive, can give your data to law enforcement, if asked, etc).
He recommends different ones in the podcast that give you full ownership and that he thinks are the best bet privacy wise. Here are the 2 that I remember off the top of my head. They are probably listed in the show notes as well.
https://www.bookmyname.com/
https://www.netim.com/en

mathiverse
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by mathiverse »

jacob wrote:
Fri Apr 21, 2023 12:19 pm
Sorry, I'm not knowledgeable enough to answer that question confidently. My unconfident answer is that all ports are available no matter your ISP plan.

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Stahlmann
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by Stahlmann »

I recently received that there's something like Oracle Free Tier. They seem to offer nice things to use it as web hosting. I followed some manual on how to set up it on independent source, but I failed to reach something meaningful (when will they introduce ChatGPT in linux terminal? :lol: simple suggestions how to write failed commands would be really nice).

Now I found this:
https://docs.oracle.com/en-us/iaas/deve ... mmary.htmI
I assume it will be more reliable guide. However, corporate ban hammer can be really hard and you can get deleted your content on whim.

During first attempt I also tried contacting support and they replied, but using their support page was slowing so much PC, I finally decided to pay small amount for commercial thing and receive minimal on demand support.

I saw local people usinng namecheap.com (can name be misleading? :lol:) so it will be sufficient. There are always domains like .tk or something like this (or it was a thing up to 2015?).

BTW, if there's simpler CMS (and ideally on somehow same level of functions or something closer to web1) than wordpress, lmk. I mean I like RMS website for simplicity, but it's possible to do it a bit better (web1 was the best web! who the hell promote these next levels unusable, resource consuming, dumped down interfaces :insane: :angry:) and I don't have time to create each file, updating index.php (yes, if you're oldschool guy you can automate this etc.).

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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by AxelHeyst »

@mathiverse I'm too much of a muggle to really answer your questions, which I think are good. I'd just say that I got the sense his main beef with Big Cloud is the same as the hyperspecialist consumer vs. polymathic postconsumer philosophical argument: it's better to be competent, to know things, to have useful skills, and not be dependent. His advice comes much for from this philosophical stance than any purely technical concerns (I think).

He even gives the analogy that it's like if you don't know how to cook and so you go out for all your meals... it's just not that hard, here's some peanut butter and some bread, there, you just made a sandwich, not hard right? He's trying to get people to understand that tech independence isn't as monstrously arcane and difficult as us muggles imagine it to be. He says a few times that he really likes people who have their own personal websites (for noncommercial purposes), and he likes helping/supporting people like that.

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Slevin
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by Slevin »

jacob wrote:
Fri Apr 21, 2023 12:19 pm
Noob question: How flexible are standard retail internet connections (e.g. cheap ass comcast subscription) in terms of opening ports? Can you in principle open any port you want or do ISPs "unhelpfully" block certain ports unless you're on an advanced $$$-plan? Or ... given that one is already uploading and downloading from the interwebs, a server basically uses the exact same ports as a browser anyway, perhaps my question is "not even wrong".
As only kinda a server guy (one level away from being a guy who works with all the physical hardware itself but configures cloud and physically hosted application software for a living), you should almost always have access to all the standard ports to do web stuff. To do extras you need to do something like listen on the port you want generally from the server application. Then the only other thing that should be blocking you is just the rules / firewall on your router, which you can adjust using instructions for your type of router. Note that bottom section on commonly abused ports.

I don't think you are really going to need to open anything extra to the whole world for a basic website, but I don't know exactly what the intent is.

If you are using a rented modem and don't own one YMMV, sometimes ISPs are weird about these and ability to open ports on modems they own. There is also a small chance of a firewall down the line somewhere blocking ports to reduce exposure, but its pretty unlikely you would run into this.

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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by Scott 2 »

As someone with the skills to self-host, I'd rather not. The challenge is long term support.

At the simplest level - remembering what you did 5 years ago, when it comes time to change something. The infrastructure side of a simple website can be complex, but demand very little attention. It's very easy to forget

At the same time - tech changes rapidly. It's possible the tools you use lose support. This can manifest in a variety of ways - from a broken website to a working site that silently compromises the security of everyone who visits it.

Run the hardware out of your closet? Then you introduce more vulnerabilities. Most obvious is hardware failures. Then there are potential ISP issues. Outages. Dynamic IPs. Unforeseen changes to network configurations. Consumer internet connections running self-hosted servers are low priority at best.

More insidious - running a server on your home network creates additional security exposure. I don't even want an internet connected doorbell.


Cloud solutions are popular with good reason.

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Stahlmann
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by Stahlmann »

jacob wrote:
Fri Apr 21, 2023 12:19 pm
Noob question: How flexible are standard retail internet connections (e.g. cheap ass comcast subscription) in terms of opening ports? Can you in principle open any port you want or do ISPs "unhelpfully" block certain ports unless you're on an advanced $$$-plan? Or ... given that one is already uploading and downloading from the interwebs, a server basically uses the exact same ports as a browser anyway, perhaps my question is "not even wrong".
Selfhosting isn't recommended for going by "Them Pros TM". It's assumed that their ethics (of not spying on you; not sure on NSA :lol:), know-how on security for low price is better than trying to fiddle with it personally. Maybe if you interested in future of "something bigger and alternative to Them TM" think about setting up Tor node or l2p server or whatever is fancy now. It can also host your website.

The first obstacle with fiddling with hosting is having static ip (in my are you have to pay for this extra and it uploading speeds are going dramatically low, the same with down), yes there are ip changers services, but in case their fault who will find you out? I haven't googled for levelling it up and providing this service for yourself :lol:, but you probably to have static ip to do this.

Assuming website is one thing, the other is the mail service. I got lost reading on technicalities as I was angry that "they said internet is free and everyone can contribute to it !!!oneoen111, scammed again !!1oneone"). It boils down to not landing on spam lists and having something something good MX records.

This is written from perspective wanna be something more than uniformed layman.

BTW, haven't you been IT admin for uni department in somewhere in your career?

jacob
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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by jacob »

Stahlmann wrote:
Fri Apr 21, 2023 1:17 pm
BTW, haven't you been IT admin for uni department in somewhere in your career?
Yes, but that was 20 years ago back when 0.1GHz was still considered fast. It's how I know how to use "port" in a sentence and yet not know how such things are handled at a practical level these days.

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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by theanimal »

Scott 2 wrote:
Fri Apr 21, 2023 1:15 pm
What I said upthread should not be taken as his actual and complete position as I have next to no knowledge regarding tech matters like these and am relating what I remember hearing from the podcast. He did mention in the podcast that this approach is designed to be robust in the sense that when well designed it will outlast any companies and be immune from losing data like you would if you were outsourcing your data on cloud like most people do now and the company failed.

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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by jacob »

theanimal wrote:
Fri Apr 21, 2023 1:33 pm
He did mention in the podcast that this approach is designed to be robust in the sense that when well designed it will outlast any companies and be immune from losing data like you would if you were outsourcing your data on cloud like most people do now and the company failed.
With the ERE site being 15 years old, this is by far my biggest concern when it comes to [electronic] data. KISS is crucial to data resilience. Moving from one platform/format to another is an absolute pain. I'm almost sure that the late 20th century/early 21st century will eventually become a new dark age. The future will not have the software or hardware to access 50 year old data. This is already a problem now going for a few decades already.

Example: The CD media was predicted to be good for 100 years (similar to a B/W photograph). In reality, they started failing much faster. However, the ability to access a CD drive became difficult even faster than that.

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Re: Setting up a website - ERE style

Post by kloquer »

Scott 2 wrote:
Fri Apr 21, 2023 1:15 pm
As someone with the skills to self-host, I'd rather not. The challenge is long term support.

At the simplest level - remembering what you did 5 years ago, when it comes time to change something. The infrastructure side of a simple website can be complex, but demand very little attention. It's very easy to forget…

More insidious - running a server on your home network creates additional security exposure. I don't even want an internet connected doorbell.
Agree with this sentiment after doing it myself for a few years. The time commitment and general anxiety it gave me for the same reasons highlighted above persuaded me to find something cheap but that still met my needs and ethical concerns. I found very low cost, easily transferable data options for everything I was self hosting before and the time/stress it’s saved me has been palatable.

I ended up using http://bearblog.dev for the website and https://purelymail.com for email/calendar/contact hosting (migadu.com is also a great host, depending on your needs.) The total for everything (including a password vault) is about $8 a month.

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