Submitted 2 weeks ago by Paddy66@lemmy.ml to selfhosted@lemmy.world
hi everyone,
I was just about to self-host a Ghost blog but then was warned that my ISP might change my external IP address at any time, so I would need to pay for a static IP address.
Is that true?
(I’d not seen much about that in stuff I’ve looked up so far about self hosting)
Whether your ip changes frequently depends on your ISP, but it’s not necessary. My public IP changes about once a year, but I use my router to update my dns and make ally external services rely on DNS and not IP to connect.
You can also do this, look up “dynamic DNS”. You just need to register a DNS name (can be free) and set up the updates to make it accurate.
I selfhost my blog without a static IP. You just need Dynamic DNS.
Keep in mind that your outbound bandwidth might be different from your inbound. I get 300mbps in, but only 5mbps out. It’s not noticeable during normal Internet use, but as you start sharing content publicly, limited bandwidth becomes really noticeable.
Don’t even need dynamic DNS. Just use ddclient to update your DNS record if your IP changes.
That’s called dynamic DNS (it’s the dd in ddclient).
You can rent a virtual private server (VPS). I used to have a number of these for under $10 / month. I imagine they might cost more now., but chances are you can still find something super affordable.
Wordpress.org will let you have a free site but you don’t get a custom domain. Wordpress.com has a personal plan for $4 / month. Matt Mullenweg (CEO) has revealed himself to be a crazy piece of shit, so maybe look elsewhere. I’m just trying to give you a sense of how accessible this stuff can be.
Running a VPS will require more learning, but it can be super gratifying if you enjoy nerdy computer stuff and solving puzzles just for self-satisfaction. I used to use Rackspace, Linode, and something else that I can’t recall at the moment. All were pretty reasonable. Rackspace had a ton of good setup guides for newbies that were well written. I’d occasionally land on those doing a web search for other hosting stuff and found them reliable.
www.hetzner.com/european-cloud Netzner can be a good alternative
It makes things easier, but you have options, such as:
As others have already commented, what you need is a Dynamic DNS service, where you register a subdomain, and setup a small program or script on your computer that pings the DDNS server every few minutes, that way you leave that running on the background, and if the program detects that the IP with the request changes, it will update the subdomain to point to it automatically.
If you want a recommendation, I have been using DuckDNS for years, and it has been pretty reliable.
I could make this quick: Is your internet access behind a NAT? If yes: you’re gonna need a static IP.
Not necessarily, Cloudflare tunnels, headscale/tailscale will sort that issue out amongst several other ways
But how will a tailnet help for a blog? At some point, the https port needs to be open.
I was going to use Cloudflare to sort this, but I’m uncomfortable how big they are getting / lack of competition in that part of the market. So we looked at Pangolin as an alternative, but it’s a faff to self host.
Hence why we’re back at exposing it straight out the back of Nginx Proxy Manager.
My router says it has NAT enabled (in the WAN settings section - for the internet connection)
It’s not about your router. But rather if your ISP connects several households with the same IP.
You don’t need one, but it does make things easier.
What you can use is something like Dynamic DNS to update your DNS record if your IP ever changes.
I would stand up a VPS in a cloud provider
Thank you for your replies everyone!
I’m looking into DDNS. Before I go with a provider, I notice that my router has this functionality built in. Should I use that?
(It’s an Asus RT-AX86U Pro - so fairly chunky in terms of spec)
(It’s an Asus RT-AX86U Pro - so fairly chunky in terms of spec)
I have your exact router make and model! I self host my own domain on my home network and make use of the built in DDNS.
I would suggest looking into Asus WRT Merlin Firmware, the custom firmware enables more functionality to your router.
Docker containers for
- Ghost
- Nginx Proxy Manager
When hosting a reverse proxy like Nginx, Traefik, SWAG, Pangolin, etc keep in mind you 80:80 and 443:443 ports need to be exposed to the host machine then you will forward those ports on your router. This will allow your reverse proxy to communicate with Lets Encrypt creating your SSL certificates Liz
Regarding Lets Encrypt you don’t your server doesn’t need to be accessible from the internet if you use the DNS-01 challenge. Caddy with the caddy-dns plugin for your provider can do that automatically for you.
That would be a good place to start. Which providers does it support?
Seconding this, it is very convenient if it supports a good provider. But it is better imo to use a good provider with a helper script on your server than to stick with your router defaults if they’re not that good.
Running a service like ddclient may give you more options at the cost of being more complicated.
Personally I would look at using a tunnel, something like Cloudflare tunnels (easy to setup, sorts dns out) but many here dislike Cloudflare for a lot of reasons. However the free plan allows you to get started, easily, and then once you are started and serving your blog you can look into other solutions, or failing that stay on Cloudflare. Other tunnels exist but if you have a domain, using cloudflare is the easiest imho to get started
Surprised nobody has mentioned cloudflare ddns. If you registered your domain with cloudflare, you can use the api or qdm12’s (author of gluetun) ddns-updater to keep your A/AAAA records up to date.
Cloudflare Tunnel is a good fit to your use case. You only need a domain name to expose your web server via Cloudflare.
there is Onionshare…
No, you don’t. Use Tailscale to expose your blog.
Wouldn’t that be just for me - in my Tailnet - rather than to the general public?
AFAIK Tailscale has an option to expose certain ports to the internet.
YunoHost has automatic DNS updates
Some of the other options are cloud flare tunnel or ddns that would give you static ip effect without static ip
You can use a ddns such as duckdns or host on github pages with jekyll or something
I used tailscale and lightsail VPS from India. hsps.in/…/how-i-host-public-apps-using-tailscale/
I just use github pages tbh. Free
How are you hosting? And do you have a domain? Lot’s of good advice here, but knowing if you’re running on a Pi, in Docker, etc, would help others give you the easiest/best method.
In short, you do not need a static IP.
Hi, I’m using Docker - one container for Ghost and one for Nginx Proxy Manager.
I’ve decided to go with DDNS but am having trouble choosing a reliable free provider. I’ve seen Dynu.com recommended but that is not available in the dropdown list of servers in my router’s section on DDNS. Is that relevant?
Or would I just ignore the router settings and set it up some other way?
Cloudflare is a good choice. I used DNSExit for a while, and also NS1, but settled on Cloudflare. You don’t have to use their proxying, just DNS.
Here’s a Docker Compose for you that will set myhost.mydomain.com to point to your public IP of wherever it is run:
dyndns-cloudflare: image: oznu/cloudflare-ddns container_name: dyndns-cloudflare environment: - API_KEY=<key> - ZONE=mydomain.com - SUBDOMAIN=myhost - PROXIED=false restart: unless-stopped
I’m having a good experience with cloudflare, using ddclient on a cron job
You could also put it on a VPS and not worry about your local connection.
Kind of depends on how you want to access it, and how you want others to access it.
hperrin@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
As others have said, you can use dynamic DNS, but you also might have an IPv6 address that doesn’t change. Or maybe it does, you’ll have to check with your ISP. But that one can be set up as an AAAA record in your DNS.
Most ISPs support IPv6, but some don’t, so you might not be accessible to everyone without also having an A record.
sem@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
I recommend afraid.org, you get everything that you need for free, and they’re a cool project so someday you may like to do even more with them or send them a little donation.
Jason2357@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
Seconded. Used their service for many years.
terminal@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
They are excellent