5 COOL APPS FOR YOUR UNRAID NAS

2024-04-27

I've got a (now four-year-old) Unraid NAS called Fox and I'm a huge fan. I
particularly love the fact that Unraid can work not only as a NAS, but also as
a fully-fledged Docker appliance, enabling me to easily install and maintain
all manner of applications.

I was chatting this week to a colleague who was considering getting a similar
setup, and he seemed to be taking notes of things he might like to install,
once he's got one. So I figured I'd round up five of my favourite things to
install on an Unraid NAS that:
* Don't require any third-party accounts (low dependencies),
* Don't need any kind of high-powered hardware (low specs), and
* Provide value with very little set up (low learning curve).

Here we go:

SYNCTHING

I've been raving about Syncthing for years. If I had an "everyday carry" list
of applications, it'd be high on that list.

Here's the skinny: you install Syncthing on several devices, then give each
the identification key of another to pair them. Now you can add folders on
each and "share" them with the others, and the two are kept in-sync. There's
lots of options for power users, but just as a starting point you can use this
to:
* Manage the photos on your phone and push copies to your desktop whenever
you're home (like your favourite cloud photo sync service, but selfhosted).
* Keep your Obsidian notes in-sync between all your devices (normally costs
$4/month). (I wrote the beginnings of this post on my phone while in the
Channel Tunnel and then carried on using my desktop computer once I was home.
Sync is magic.)
* Get a copy of the documents from all your devices onto your NAS, for backup
purposes (note that sync'ing alone, even with versioning enabled, is not a
good backup: the idea is that you run an actual backup from your NAS!).

HUGINN

You know IFTTT? Zapier? Services that help you to "automate" things based on
inputs and outputs. Huginn's like that, but selfhosted. Also: more-powerful.

The learning curve is steeper than anything else on this list, and I almost
didn't include it for that reason alone. But once you've learned your way
around its idiosyncrasies and dipped your toe into the more-advanced
Javascript-powered magic it can do, you really begin to unlock its potential.

It couples well with Home Assistant, if that's your jam. But even without it,
you can find yourself automating things you never expected to.

FRESHRSS

I've written a lot about how and why FreshRSS continues to be my favourite RSS
reader. But you know what's even better than an awesome RSS reader? An awesome
selfhosted RSS reader!

Many of these suggested apps benefit well from you exposing them to the open
Web rather than just running them on your LAN, and an RSS reader is probably
the best example (you want to read your news feeds when you're out and about,
right?). What you need for that is a reverse proxy, and there are lots of
guides to doing it super-easily, even if you're not on a static IP address. (I
can't share or recommend one reverse proxy guide in particular because I set
my own up because I can configure Nginx in my sleep, but I did a quick search
and found several that all look good so I imagine you can do the same. You
don't have to do it on day one, though!). Alternatively you can just VPN in to
your home: your router might be able to arrange this, or else Unraid can do it
for you!

OPEN TRASHMAIL

You know how sometimes you need to give somebody your email address but you
don't actually want to. Like: sure, I'd like you to email me a verification
code for this download, but I don't trust you not to spam me later! What you
need is a disposable email address. (Obviously there are lots of approachable
to on-demand disposable email addresses, including the venerable "plus sign in
a GMail address" trick, but Open Trashmail is just... better for many cases.)

You just need to install Open Trashmail, point the MX records of a few domain
names or subdomains (you've got some spare domain names lying around, right?
if not; they're pretty cheap...) at it, and it will now accept email to any
address on those domains. You can make up addresses off the top of your head,
even away from an Internet connection when using a paper-based form, and they
work. You can check them later if you want to... or ignore them forever.

Couple it with an RSS reader, or Huginn, or Slack, and you can get a
notification or take some action when an email arrives!
* Need to give that escape room your email address to get a copy of your "team
photo"? Give them a throwaway, pick up the picture when you get home, and then
forget you ever gave it to them.
* Company give you a freebie on your birthday if you sign up their mailing
list? Sign up 366 times with them and write a Huginn workflow that puts
"today's" promo code into your Obsidian notetaking app (Sync'd over Syncthing)
but filters out everything else.
* Suspect some organisation is selling your email address on to third parties?
Give them a unique email address that you only give to them and catch them in
a honeypot.

YOURLS

Finally: a URL shortener. The Internet's got lots of them, but they're all at
the mercy of somebody else (potentially somebody in a country that might not
be very-friendly with yours...).

Plus, it's just kinda cool to be able to brand your shortlinks with your own
name, right? If you follow only one link from this post, let it be to watch
this video that helps explain why this is important:
danq.link/url-shortener-highlights.

I run many, many other Docker containers and virtual machines on my NAS. These
five aren't even the "top five" that I use... they're just five that are great
starters because they're easy and pack a lot of joy into their learning curve.

And if your NAS can't do all the above... consider Unraid for your next NAS!

LINKS

My blog post about building Fox, my Unraid NAS

Unraid

My blog post about getting a serious electrical shock recently.

Syncthing

A blog post of mine raving about Syncthing.

My "lifestack 2023" blog post, mentioning Syncthing.

Obsidian

Huginn

My blog post about loving our dog, despite categorically not being a "dog person".

Home Assistant

FreshRSS

My blog posts about how and why FreshRSS continues to be my favourite RSS reader

My blog post about why "RSS Zero" isn't necessarily an admirable goal.

Unraid can do it for you

Open Trashmail

My blog post about putting plus signs in your GMail address to help combat spam.

YOURLS

Terence Eden's blog post about UK Government departments using bit.ly as a URL shortener even though .ly is under the control of the Libyan government.

DanQ.link shortlink to... a video about URL shorteners, I guess?