Tag: homelab

Cilium on k3s: When eBPF Networking Pays

Replace flannel with Cilium 1.19 on k3s for eBPF routing, Hubble observability, WireGuard encryption, and L7 network policies — here's when it pays off.

k3s + Tailscale: Cluster Across Two Sites

Run a single k3s cluster spanning two physical sites using Tailscale as the WireGuard fabric — home lab server plus cloud VPS, one single kubectl context.

KubeVirt on k3s: VMs Next to Pods

Run real KVM virtual machines as Kubernetes resources on k3s. One control plane for pods and VMs — no more juggling Proxmox alongside your cluster every day.

ClickHouse vs DuckDB vs StarRocks: Light OLAP

ClickHouse, DuckDB, or StarRocks for home lab analytics? A practical guide to picking the right OLAP engine for your query patterns without losing the weekend.

Adding NOT NULL on a Big Table Without Downtime

How to safely add a NOT NULL column with a live backfill on a 200M-row Postgres table without locking your users out or scheduling any maintenance downtime.

Postgres HA: Patroni + etcd + HAProxy

Build a real Postgres 17 HA cluster with Patroni 4.x, etcd 3.5, and HAProxy — fully automatic failover, tested switchover procedure, zero manual babysitting.

Dragonfly vs Redis: Single-Binary Performance

DragonflyDB vs Redis 7.4 and Valkey 8.x: architecture deep dive, real performance benchmarks, honest gotchas, and when to swap your cache layer for a dragon.

ntfy vs Gotify vs Apprise: Push Stacks

ntfy is curl-friendly push with iOS. Gotify is self-hosted with web UI. Apprise abstracts 70+ providers. Here's how to wire homelab notifications.

KeyDB: A Redis Fork With Multi-Threading

KeyDB forked Redis and shipped multi-threaded I/O and active-active replication years before Redis itself did. Here is whether it is still worth using today.

pg_repack vs VACUUM FULL: Reclaim Bloat Live

Postgres table bloat killing your query performance? Compare VACUUM FULL vs pg_repack and learn how to reclaim disk space live without any scheduled downtime.

pg_stat_statements: What Most Tutorials Miss

pg_stat_statements is far more than a slow query log. Here is what most tutorials skip entirely: tail latency percentiles, cache hit ratios, and WAL bloat.

Mealie vs Tandoor vs Grocy Kitchen Stack

Mealie is the polished recipe app. Tandoor is the kitchen-ops powerhouse. Grocy tracks your entire house. Here's how to pick a self-hosted kitchen stack.