I Don't Maintain My Homelab

I Don’t Maintain My Homelab / 我不维护我的家庭实验室

2026-06-26 I Don’t maintain my homelab… it maintains itself. 2026-06-26 我不维护我的家庭实验室……它自己维护自己。

Table of Contents / 目录

Infrastructure / 1. 基础设施 1.1. Server / 1.1. 服务器 1.2. Network / 1.2. 网络
Software / 2. 软件
The Outcome / 3. 结果

It’s true. I don’t maintain my homelab… it maintains itself. Have I reached nirvana? Is this the ultimate goal of homelabbers? It seems that I’ve somehow automated myself out of a job (hobby?) by building a resilient homelab. Let’s figure out where it all went “wrong”. 这是真的。我不维护我的家庭实验室……它自己维护自己。我达到涅槃了吗？这是家庭实验室玩家的终极目标吗？看来我通过构建一个高弹性的家庭实验室，不知不觉中让自己“失业”了（或者说失去了这个爱好？）。让我们来看看这一切是在哪里“出错”的。

1. Infrastructure / 1. 基础设施

1.1. Server / 1.1. 服务器

I have used a few different servers over the years, but have since consolidated all of my services onto a single server (build guide here), reducing the complexity of my environment. Because of the single-server setup, maintenance is down 75% (from four servers to one). Yes, clusters and hypervisors and hybrid cloud solutions are shiny and fancy and popular, but I just don’t care for it. Instead, I have a single metal box I can pick up with my hands sitting in my basement. 多年来我用过不少不同的服务器，但后来我将所有服务整合到了一台服务器上（构建指南见此），从而降低了环境的复杂性。由于采用了单服务器设置，维护工作量减少了 75%（从四台服务器减少到一台）。没错，集群、虚拟机管理程序和混合云解决方案确实光鲜亮丽且流行，但我并不感兴趣。相反，我地下室里只有一个我能用手拎起来的金属盒子。

I do have one more “server”: a Raspberry Pi 4, but it uses Home Assistant OS, updates itself, and requires literally zero maintenance. Is that really a server? I guess, by technical definition. But it certainly doesn’t feel like it; it feels like I’ve turned a potential server device into a self-sustaining IoT device instead. 我确实还有另一台“服务器”：一台树莓派 4，但它运行的是 Home Assistant OS，会自动更新，几乎不需要任何维护。那真的算服务器吗？从技术定义上讲，我想是的。但它给人的感觉完全不像；我觉得我把一个潜在的服务器设备变成了一个自给自足的物联网设备。

1.2. Network / 1.2. 网络

Aside from the server itself, I have a mini rack of UniFi gear (server is in the same rack). A UniFi Dream Machine Pro, a switch, and a couple of access points (APs) constitute my personal data center sitting in my basement. Again, it really just maintains itself. UniFi supports automatic and scheduled updates, allowing you to disconnect from any manual maintenance of the hardware. UniFi truly is a “set it and forget it” platform. 除了服务器本身，我还有一个装有 UniFi 设备的小型机架（服务器也在同一个机架里）。一台 UniFi Dream Machine Pro、一台交换机和几个接入点（AP）构成了我放在地下室的个人数据中心。同样，它也完全是自动维护的。UniFi 支持自动和定时更新，让你无需进行任何硬件的手动维护。UniFi 真的是一个“设置好就不用管”的平台。

2. Software / 2. 软件

There’s a single crontab line on my server, which runs all updates for my Docker services on a weekly basis. 我的服务器上只有一行 crontab 命令，每周运行一次，用于更新我所有的 Docker 服务。

0 0 * * 0 docker-update

Which is an alias for: 这其实是以下命令的别名：

for d in ~/docker/*/; do (cd "$d" && sudo docker compose pull && sudo docker compose up -d); done

I do run a few crontab schedules via the root user as well, to account for permission issues. These jobs are really just for backups, to be honest. I’ve never required a backup, but it’s good to be safe. 为了处理权限问题，我也通过 root 用户运行了一些 crontab 定时任务。老实说，这些任务主要就是为了备份。虽然我从没真正用到过备份，但有备无患总是好的。

(Code block omitted for brevity, containing standard backup scripts for databases and ZFS pools) (此处省略代码块，包含数据库和 ZFS 存储池的标准备份脚本)

Aside from this, the only other required updates are running apt update and potentially restarting. This requires about 60 seconds of time whenever I want to do it. 除此之外，唯一需要的更新就是运行 apt update 并可能需要重启。每当我想要执行这些操作时，大约只需要 60 秒的时间。

sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y && sudo apt autoremove -y

3. The Outcome / 3. 结果

So, what’s the end result? I’ve approximated it somewhere around 15 minutes of maintenance per month, barring an emergency. If that’s normal to you, congrats - you’ve peaked in life. However, that’s absolutely absurd to me. I used to spend days on end building, maintaining, and debugging various aspects of my servers, databases, apps, etc. 那么，最终结果如何？除去紧急情况，我估计每月大约只需要 15 分钟的维护时间。如果这对你来说很正常，恭喜你——你的人生已经达到巅峰了。然而，这对我来说简直不可思议。我过去常常花费数天时间来构建、维护和调试服务器、数据库、应用程序等的各个方面。

You know what’s even crazier? If I don’t have 15 minutes in a month to ssh into my server and update things, it literally does not affect anything. I could probably go 6 months (maybe more?) without touching it and it wouldn’t break. (This is not a challenge, please don’t break my server.) What a great situation to be in - especially for someone who’s become as busy in their career as I have. I feel like I’ve struck a fantastic balance between privacy, security, and convenience. 你知道更疯狂的是什么吗？如果我一个月里连 15 分钟的时间都抽不出来 SSH 进服务器去更新一下，它实际上也不会受到任何影响。我大概可以 6 个月（甚至更久？）不去碰它，它也不会崩溃。（这不是挑战，请不要弄坏我的服务器。）能处于这种状态真是太棒了——尤其是对于像我这样职业生涯变得如此忙碌的人来说。我觉得自己在隐私、安全和便利性之间找到了一个绝佳的平衡点。