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Homelab Builder

Build your own homelab.

Try a photo library, a website or another service in different places. This sketch helps compare ideas; it does not save a plan, install software or provision a server.

Service ideas

Local

Your hardware

Cloud

Your cloud server

Managed serverless

Your services. No server to manage.

Scroll through the ideas. Drag one across, or select it and choose a home.

Swipe up or down through the ideas. Drag an icon sideways to place it, or tap an icon and then its home.

Explore an idea; nothing is installed or saved. Managed serverless illustrates individually cared-for services.

Explore more ideas with the arrows.

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Photos Life with your own service

Your photo collection, with a home of its own.

Bring the pictures scattered across phones and folders into a collection you can revisit and share.

Next: find the right home for this service
Illustration of a family revisiting pictures together on a sofa, with their home server on a shelf.
  • After a weekend away

    Bring photos from different phones into one collection, then make an album for the trip.

  • A family album

    Share selected pictures with relatives through the photo app, while keeping the rest of your library separate.

  • Old pictures, rediscovered

    Add scanned prints and forgotten hard-drive photos, then organise them by date and album for easier rediscovery.

Compare how it runs

Where would Photos live?

Our recommendation: Local

Explore the differences, then add a place to your homelab idea.

Compare how it runs

Where would Photos live?

Our recommendation: Local A growing photo library benefits from storage you can expand at home and quick imports over your own network. Keep a separate copy away from the house for the memories you cannot replace.

Your hardware

Local

Recommended

Best forA growing family photo and video archive

Advantages

  • Import large albums over your home network
  • Expand the library with additional drives

Drawbacks

  • A drive failure or loss of the house must not take the only copy

Your cloud server

Cloud

Best forA shared library for family living in different places

Advantages

  • Relatives viewing albums do not compete for your home upload bandwidth

Drawbacks

  • Moving an existing collection online can take a long initial upload

Your services. No server to manage.

Managed serverless

Future service concept

Best forSharing and organising albums without running the photo backend

Advantages

  • Leave thumbnail generation and photo-indexing software to the service operator

Drawbacks

  • Check whether original files, albums and metadata can all be exported

Managed serverless means an individually cared-for service, without a dedicated server for you to manage. Supported offers are still being developed.

Open software to explore

Meet one possible starting point.

Immich Photo and video software with a web library and mobile uploads.Explore the official project

These are software examples. Current Techstack and StackKits documentation describes supported combinations.

Photos — Your photo collection, with a home of its own.

Your next step

Ready to make your idea real?

Techstack takes it from this sketch to a running setup, at home or in the cloud.

Get started Install it yourself