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w33k in g33k: December 05, 2025

· Sean P. McAdam

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selh.st: Self-Host Weekly #147: Ad-Free, by Ethan Sholly

  • I didn’t get a chance to make my weekly post with the holiday last week, so these were a few of the projects I had saved from Ethan’s post.
  • GitHub: tokendad/NesVentory: “NesVentory is a modern home inventory management application that helps you track and organize your household items, their locations, warranties, and maintenance schedules.”
    • I may not do anything with this, but with being a new homeowner, part of me at least wants to take a look & see if this would be beneficial.
  • GitHub: gelatinescreams/The-One-File: “In the end there can only be “The ONE File”, your portable, immortal network topology maker for when everything else goes down.”
    • I really wish I could get NetAlertX working again, but for now I’ve just been using WatchYourLAN to monitor network devices.
  • GitLab: dbrc-grp/training-journal: “A modern, self-hosted workout tracking application built with PHP, JavaScript, and CSS. Track your exercises, manage training sessions, and monitor your fitness progress with an intuitive drag-and-drop interface.”
    • Maybe motivation to workout more.
  • GitHub: venkyr77/jellarr: “Declarative configuration engine for Jellyfin — apply and sync server settings from YAML via the Jellyfin API.”
  • GitHub: OrwellianEpilogue/ephemera: “Search and download books from your girl’s favorite archive. Includes a request system to auto-download books once they’re available. Supports auto-move to a BookLore or Calibre-Web-Automated ingest folder or BookLore API upload.”
  • GitHub: karanhudia/borg-ui: “Replace complex Borg Backup terminal commands with a beautiful web UI. Create, schedule, and restore backups with just a few clicks.”

Games

Health

IT Security

Linux

Privacy

Self-Hosted

  • Benjamin Tseng: Backup Your Home Server with Duplicati
    • This is what a friend of mine is using for backups & I’m starting to look into. Originally i was doing Borg
    • I may be looking into Restic too
  • マリウス: Be Your Own Privacy-Respecting Google, Bing & Brave
    • I’ve looked into SearXNG a few times over the years but never really sat down with it. I may start looking at it again though.
  • GitHub: tokendad/NesVentory: “NesVentory is a modern home inventory management application that helps you track and organize your household items, their locations, warranties, and maintenance schedules.”
  • GitHub: gelatinescreams/The-One-File: “In the end there can only be “The ONE File”, your portable, immortal network topology maker for when everything else goes down.”
  • GitLab: dbrc-grp/training-journal: “A modern, self-hosted workout tracking application built with PHP, JavaScript, and CSS. Track your exercises, manage training sessions, and monitor your fitness progress with an intuitive drag-and-drop interface.”
  • GitHub: venkyr77/jellarr: “Declarative configuration engine for Jellyfin — apply and sync server settings from YAML via the Jellyfin API.”
  • GitHub: OrwellianEpilogue/ephemera: “Search and download books from your girl’s favorite archive. Includes a request system to auto-download books once they’re available. Supports auto-move to a BookLore or Calibre-Web-Automated ingest folder or BookLore API upload.”
  • GitHub: karanhudia/borg-ui: “Replace complex Borg Backup terminal commands with a beautiful web UI. Create, schedule, and restore backups with just a few clicks.”
  • Infosec.Pub: Favorite Self-Hosted Tools in 2025 (Looking for More Suggestions!)
  • Infosec.Pub: Pixelix
    • F-Droid: Pixelix: “Pixelix provides a smooth and intuitive interface for interacting with Pixelfed, the federated image-sharing social network. Designed with user experience in mind, Pixelix makes it simple to connect to your Pixelfed instance, upload photos directly from your device, and browse through your feed with ease. Whether you’re a seasoned Pixelfed user or just getting started, Pixelix offers a streamlined way to share and discover visual content.”
  • GitHub: HonKLam / Dynos: “Third-Party & offline-first App for @usememos for iOS & Android”
  • GitHub: ANGulchenko / whatmade: “Whatmade is a Linux daemon that monitors user-specified directories and records which process created each file.”

Miscellaneous

Let’s start with Journal by Apple, launched in December 2023. It’s fair to say there haven’t been a ton of updates released for the app since then, but all of the essentials are covered: Your journal entries can combine text, photos, videos, audio, locations, and sketches, and you can even set up multiple journals for different purposes.

I do like the way this app makes suggestions for journaling, particularly in terms of recent locations and photos—it means it’s easier to get started or to jump back in after a while. There are also a good number of options for what you can attach to your journal entries, and I can see myself using the mood slider a lot.

      • Journal by Google

As for the Journal app that Google recently launched for Android, it is limited to those with a phone from the Pixel 8, Pixel 9, and Pixel 10 series. It’s also pretty bare bones: I was able to log text, photos, videos, and places, as well as fitness data collected through Health Connect, but there’s nothing here for audio or moods.

In addition, the interface is rather plain—much more spartan than the Apple equivalent. You do get a neat overview of all your posts, but it’s not particularly inspiring, and you can’t configure multiple journals. In addition, the AI-powered prompts for what to write about remain exclusive to Pixel 10 handsets, so you have to do without these on the Pixel 8 and Pixel 9.

    • The best third-party journal apps
      • Day One

Outside of Google and Apple, Day One (Android and iOS) has long been one of the best journaling apps around—and you can take it with you if you ever jump between the Apple and Google platforms. It’s been around since 2011 and is stacked with features, including multiple view types, prompts, tags, summaries, recaps, and a gorgeous design that looks great on every device.

Your entries can include all the usual features, plus weather details, playlists, health data, social media posts, and more. You get a lot for free, but there is also a premium plan available for $50 a year. It gives you support for unlimited images, videos, and audio, plus extras like the ability to create journal entries over email.

      • 5 Minute Journal

As someone just dipping a toe into the world of journaling, 5 Minute Journal (Android and iOS) appeals right from the name. The idea is you don’t have to spend too long jotting down your thoughts and ideas each day, and the app is geared towards getting you to record the more positive aspects of your life, boosting mindfulness and well-being.

I like the writing prompts and journaling reminders this app provides to keep you motivated, as well as the really simple way you can log your mood as you go. It’s also a beautifully designed and organized app—a completely different aesthetic experience than a more utilitarian option like Google Journal. However, some features (including unlimited photos and videos) requires a premium subscription, which starts at $5 a month.

      • Rosebud Journal

One more recommendation from my own experience: Rosebud (Android and iOS). It’s branded as “AI-powered” but thankfully you don’t have to worry too much about that, and it does a really nice job of summarizing and tracking your thoughts over time, as well as encouraging you to jot stuff down in the here and now.

The app does quite a bit of hand-holding and prompting, but that’s perfect if you’re just getting started or struggling to journal each day, and you can always just jot down standard journal entries with text and images if you prefer. As you might have guessed given the other options on my list, there is a pro-level subscription for $13 a month that gives you a lot more insights in terms of past entries, trends, and emotional patterns and triggers, if an AI’s summary of your life is interesting to you.

selh.st: Self-Host Weekly #148: Maintenance Mode , by Ethan Sholly

  • GitHub: Jellify-Music / App: “A cross-platform, free and open source music player for Jellyfin, powered by React Native”
  • /r/CyberDeck: A prototype of our modular Linux handheld. Powered by STM32MP157.: I know I already have it saved above, I just wanted to mention it again (for myself) to look into.
  • GitHub: shellhub-io / shellhub: “💻 Get seamless remote access to any Linux device. Centralized SSH for the edge and cloud computing”
    • ShellHub: “Take control of your servers and devices from any location while boosting security through our centralized SSH gateway tailored for edge and cloud computing.”
    • ShellHub: Deploying
  • GitHub: thekampany / atsameage: “A photo slideshow application that displays photos from your Immich instance of people who were the same age when their photos were taken.”
    • I just like looking into projects that integrate with platforms I use, like this with Immich.
  • GitHub: Reggio-Digital / wishlist: “A simple, self-hosted wishlist app for sharing gift ideas with family and friends.”
    • I don’t know if i saved this one previously, but i really should see about using one of these since it’s almost through the first week of December… or at least get one setup soon & it can be for more than just holidays.
  • GitHub: therobbiedavis / Listenarr: “Listenarr automates audiobook collection management similar to Sonarr or Radarr, but for audiobooks. It can search, download, and organize your library automatically using metadata from Audible and other sources.”
    • Another “arr” service i was going to take a look at.
  • GitHub: timothepoznanski / poznote: “A lightweight yet powerful web app for taking notes.”
    • I have an issue where I feel like I need to try every notes app… even with all the ones I’m currently running.
  • YouTube: Everything Smart Home: Everything New In Home Assistant 2025.12!