What is the point of Casaos ? reddit / selfhosted ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-15 16:14 Hello, I installed Casaos with no real knowledge of homelabs, docker and self hosting about a month ago, and i had a ton of problems since then, and started wondering why even use casaos in the first place. As I see it, it's just a good looking dashboard with an app store that doesn't really help, with a docker app system that lacks important features like custom networking, and a good looking file explorer that is not useful, and for the past month I asked myself a tons of times what is the actual benefit of using casaos. It's custom docker management made me wonder if you should stay on it or use portainer, which actually seems better, but i don't want to install a docker management app on a system that already has one, it seems odd to me, and the custom /DATA folder made me make so many errors when setting up arr\* that i wonder why it's even there. My point is, even if it feels easy at start, it will just make you not learn the right way because most users will need features that aren't there, and learn all over again. The only thing that seems really good and that i didn't find on other dashboards is a ssh terminal that is really useful, but as i see it, Casaos is really close to be a really good dashboard for beginners and a little more advanced users, and it's so close that it makes it hard to decide wether sticking to it is a good idea or not. For example with a nextcloud install, you then need to setup a MariaDB install if you want to have a good setup, and things immediately get a lot more complicated than when you just clicked on a button to install nextcloud. Maybe casaos needs apps "stacks" where everything is already configured. So, maybe casaos can and will become better, but at this moment i really don't know what to do, i still have errors not finished, and maybe a clean install into something like homarr would be better. And, can someone for once explain what is this custom /DATA folder for ? it caused me so much trouble, i don't want anyone to experience it. I mean, why not use basic linux folders ? And for example, am i then supposed to setup my \*arr apps for hardlinks on the downloads folder and the medias folder or elsewhere ? cause elsewhere is so counter intuitive, and the medias and downloads folders had been a mess for me. And can this be finally answered, i found nothing : Should you, for the moment as casaos lacks a lot of features, Install and use Portainer instead of the Casaos sytem, or just leave Casaos when you encounter such dilemna ? Anyway, I just wanted to share my Casaos experience as a real self hosting newbie, because the learning with casaos has not been easy for me. Have a good day ! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SnooPets20 · 2023-11-15 16:31 Just a frontend that tries to simply the process. Same as Unraid, same as Umbral and many others. Just do it manually. Abstraction layers suck balls when you don't know what they abstract in the first place. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- EndlessHiway · 2023-11-15 16:50 Everything you said you can't do in CasaOS you can do on CasaOS. Seems the problem is your basic understanding of computers and Linux. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-15 17:11 I guess your basic computer understanding is not high enough too, hit ctrl + f on your keyboard and search the keyword "can't". if it doesn't returns "can't" more than once, it seems you can't read because I never say I couldn't, as you can in fact do everything you want on a linux computer with casaos because of the ssh on the shell that's on it. So please, don't just come here to trash talk with no arguments. At least, explain why i'm wrong and help me use it better, or else, just don't answer my post please. Have a nice day. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-15 17:15 Thanks ! I guess I'll go with hommar or homer as my dashboard then, and hope i'll be able to find a way to connect to ssh to my server directly in the same dashboard ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SnooPets20 · 2023-11-15 17:19 Why do you need that functionality in the dashboard? Just connect via terminal. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-15 17:37 Yeah I guess you're right, it's not really important, that's just an habit I got from casaos, but I find having only one window pretty convenient. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- azukaar · 2023-11-15 17:39 I don't understand why you are being so defensive about it, there's no need to flame that person, it's a genuine comment that you seem (once again, it's a hypothesis based on incomplete data) to not be in full control of Docker and Sysadmin. I am sure you know a lot but without trying to be patronizing about it, for example "the custom /DATA folder made me make so many errors when setting up arr\*" is a weird statement that could lead someone to think that you are still missing some experience ---------------------------------------------------------------------- bobbarker4444 · 2023-11-15 17:39 Like others have said, it's just an attempt to make selfhosting some things prettier and more user friendly while also giving you a system you could daily drive. Honestly if you're even a little bit familiar with Linux, I would say just install Proxmox instead. It's such a good tool that will make experimenting and learning so much easier. If you still need docker then install portainer in an LXC or VM and off you go ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-15 17:41 Yeah I'm sorry, I had a bad day. I still think his answer is not really constructive. I'll edit mine, and sorry if anyone got offended. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- azukaar · 2023-11-15 17:44 My point of vue is CasaOS / Unraid / Umbrel serve a good "first base" with selfhosting. Kind of like a gateway drug: gives you the candy to see how nice it could be but really under the hood, they are lacking a lot of substance. I would never advise someone to limit their experience to those tools thought, as they lack so many things that are required for a proper long term selfhosting setup (monitoring, backups, encryptions, reverse-proxy, etc..............). It's a decent start thought. Finally one criticism I could make is, unlike what you often read, I think it's ok to abstract things. But the issue is, if you're going to abstract away Docker completely you better make sure to offer everything the user needs to deal with their apps, and as far as I can tell, not only it's not the case, but also those tools kind of tend to be opiniated in questionable ways. I have never used CasaOS thought, so it's only 3rd party observation ---------------------------------------------------------------------- thekrautboy · 2023-11-15 17:44 If you are looking for something similar, but better, look at /r/CosmosServer. If you want to do everything yourself and have full control, run something like plain Debian, install Docker/Compose, deploy whatever you want. If you desperately need a WebUI for that, look at the usual suspect Portainer, or yacht or Dockge. Fyi using Cosmos doesnt exclude you from using any of the other things, its not either that or nothing. You can run Cosmos together with existing Docker deployments. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-15 17:48 Thanks ! I always tought about Proxmox, but I never really understood the use case i could have for it, but i'll dig deeper. I'm just scared that I'll end up having one VM for my docker stuff and that's it, tho I don't know how much power and cpu/ram usage it will take compared to a basic os without the proxmox virtualization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-15 17:55 Thanks for your answer ! Actually, you can add custom docker images in casaos if that's what you meant, but yeah my real problem is that it seems really close to a really good "os" in the long run, but still have too much issues for me at the moment. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- bobbarker4444 · 2023-11-15 18:01 Even if you just have a single VM or LXC under Proxmox, I would still try it out. It's fun to learn, makes backup/management of that VM/LXC easy, and makes any future experimenting you want to do super easy as well. Proxmox itself has very little overhead, plus you can run portainer in a very light-weight LXC rather than a fully fledged VM. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-15 18:15 Okay then ! I'll run Proxmox ! Thanks a lot ! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- RaiseRuntimeError · 2023-11-15 18:20 I was thinking about giving CasaOS a try but i think i might just stick with bare metal Ubuntu server with Docker/Docker Compose after reading your complaint. Hell even Portainer bugs me so i guess i cant imagine CasaOS now. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- azukaar · 2023-11-15 18:27 I was more refering to things like long term management of the softwares, without having to go back to CLI / docker-compose as a tool. For example managing volumes is completely inexistant AFAIK in Casa, because they took the opinion not to use them at all, and that everything should be in /DATA (or whatever that folder is). It's fine to a certain extent, but it's not the best practice in term of containerization ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ChocoDarkMatter · 2023-11-15 18:43 I have a small dell nuc with 24gb ram about 30 docker containers running and ram is about 22% utilization right now. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- useless_mlungu · 2023-11-15 18:44 /u/louislam (of Uptime Kuma fame) just released dockge which is kinda the best of portainer simplified stack management, and using a manual CLI. Still in early development but really quite nice. To be clear, it's not a drop in replacement in the slightest for Portainer, but what it does it does well. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Simon-RedditAccount · 2023-11-15 18:45 The same as NPM. Plain nginx allows much more, but people don't want to read the manual and write configs. And then they complain that ~~nginx~~ NPM lacks A, NPM lacks B etc... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-15 19:10 Thanks ! I'll dive more into Cosmos, it seems really good ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-15 19:17 Yeah, I still think casaos has the potential to be a really good dashboard and all, but for now it might not be the best answer. Someone mentionned Cosmos as an alternative, which looks really good tho. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- tech2but1 · 2023-11-15 19:27 I've looked at a couple of these type things (including Portainer and CosmosOS) and they just add another level of complexity. https://github.com/louislam/dockge looks to be a lot simpler and allows you to use commands that everyone is familiar with. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- azukaar · 2023-11-15 19:44 Just so we are clear I still support the usage of tools like NPM. Abstraction and simplification is good, there's no point doing complicated for the sake of being complicated. You can serve any selfhosted app with NPM (as far as I understand the tool, I have never used it). Otherwise you just escalate into a fallacy statement Of always deconstructing for the sake of it ---------------------------------------------------------------------- EndlessHiway · 2023-11-15 19:56 I understand you are very ignorant about computers and Linux and you are frustrated how something as simple as CasaOS is beyond your intellectual capabilities. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Simon-RedditAccount · 2023-11-15 20:06 NPM [is just a nice UI + automation for nginx](https://nginxproxymanager.com/screenshots/). Those tools are good - both for newcomers and for non-sysadmins. But in the meantime they significantly restrain the user in terms of capabilities. My point is, don't be afraid of growing up and stepping out from nice GUI-supported world to the world of real capabilities ... The same is for casaOS etc. I have lots of not-tech-savvy, but clever friends. They probably would be happy with Casa/Cosmos/Umbrel etc. Setting their own server with ubuntu + docker is nevertheless beyond their *current* capabilities. They are capable of learning it and be able to do much more - *but it requires typing something in the console...* ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dev_all_the_ops · 2023-11-15 20:20 Casaos is new. It is pretty similar to portainer. It is still a pretty frontend for debian targeted twards tinkerers. The end goal is for ZimaOS to replace/supliment CasaOS which is intended to be a more direct competitor to Synology/QNAP software. ZimaOS will be the OS released on their [ZimaCube Kickstarter](https:/ /www.kickstarter.com/projects/icewhaletech/zimacube-personal-cloud-re- invented) As others have mentioned there are competitors like Cosmos-server and Umbrel. CasaOS/ZimaOS has a pretty strong company behind it, so the chances it gets abandoned are low. Cosmos and Umbrel are more of a hobby of a few people that may or may not be around 5 years from now. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- azukaar · 2023-11-15 20:37 I still think there's a future where it will be viable to manage a server from UI only with /almost/ no need for a terminal. Just like you would manage your PC or your phone. I dont think you necessarily need to outgrow your UIs ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Valuable-Question706 · 2023-11-15 20:49 Windows Server + IIS is exactly that option. I have mixed opinions on this approach and cannot say if it's just good or just bad. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Silencer306 · 2023-11-15 21:22 Eli5 for Proxmox? And what are the other similar tools that does the same job? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- RetiredDonut · 2023-11-15 21:30 I have casaos on my home server. It was the first thing I installed on it a while back, so it served as a good introduction, but I keep it on the server even now as a sort of dashboard backup. If for some reason I need a 2nd file manager because the primary is having issues it could be helpful sort of thing. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Girgoo · 2023-11-15 21:30 Proxmox adds complexity. Only use it if you intend to run more than one virtual machine. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Accomplished-Lack721 · 2023-11-15 21:51 I installed it because I was curious, and still learning some things about Docker. I pretty quickly used it to install portrainer, and I've since managed everything from there. The file manager is moderately handy, but nothing I couldn't do either with the command line or another filemanager tool I'd install through Docker itself. I still have it set up because I have no need to change it, but I wouldn't use it if I were doing my setup from scratch. I'm kind of curious about Cosmos as what seems like a more comprehensive alternative, but I'm pretty happy with how I have some of its other functions (like reverse proxy) set up now, so if I try it, it'll probably just be to tinker. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Accomplished-Lack721 · 2023-11-15 21:56 If you find Portainer constraining, you definitely won't like CasaOs (though poking around, I think CasaOS is actually more flexible than it seems at first glance). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- BioDieselDog · 2023-11-15 22:01 It does, but arguably also ads simplicity. Making backups, using the console, moving a VM to another machine are all very easy in proxmox. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- BioDieselDog · 2023-11-15 22:10 I really like casaos because of how all-in-one it is. Copy one script into a new Ubuntu server install and everything is ready to go in minutes. It makes for a good all in one server for people with little Linux/docker knowledge, but also allows you to do whatever you want with the OS or docker. The biggest downside right now is lack of RAID support, but ZimaOS which is kind of like a fork of casaos, will be adding it soon. For me, a good intuitive, but also powerful gui like Casaos is great since I'm new to docker but want to utilize it now. Also, I may set and forget my server stuff for months at a time, so when I get back to it I don't want to have to remember certain Linux commands, I can more quickly refamilarize myself with the GUI. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Girgoo · 2023-11-15 22:23 Yes, it is good if you have the need. Just saying that people should not be afraid to start without doing virtualization. I like KISS. Keep it stuiped simple. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- p4ck3ts · 2023-11-16 01:01 its just a L7 or UI for docker instances and making selfhosting much easier. you can do this all in the console if you want. casaos just makes installing apps much easier. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Mr_1984 · 2023-11-16 05:28 I find it useful as a dashboard for things for my wife. I have links to my switches, firewall, and nas added. Keeps things tidy and simple. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Manicraft1001 · 2023-11-16 06:12 Hi OP, maintainer of Homarr here 👋. I'm pretty sure that our tool isn't a 1:1 replacement for what you're searching for. We do not have a widget for SSH nor an app store. If that's what you're looking for the suggestions above will probably do better in your case. But Homarr is still a nice to have to organise your selfhosted applications regardless. Just let me know if you have any questions regarding it or need assistance. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-16 11:08 Hi, thanks a lot for your answer ! Yeah, I know that it's not the same as Casa, but I love a lot of things in homarr, and as u/SnooPets20 pointed out, an ssh widget is not that important, and I don't really need an app store. So i'll go with either homarr or cosmos, i don't know yet. Anyways, thanks a lot for making what homarr is today ! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Manicraft1001 · 2023-11-16 11:12 No problem, glad that I was able to help. Let me know if you need anything. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-16 11:12 Thanks for your answer, and for mentionning ZimaOS that i didn't know, I'll try to submit my issues to casaos's github so maybe they get fixed one day, because I actually really believe this could become great. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-16 11:26 Yes i agree, but the things with casaos, as for me, is that you too quickly hit a wall where the really good interface just makes it harder to do things, as there are too many ways you can do them. I don't think casa is made for people who completely don't want to learn docker and linux like yunohost, because you really have to to use it well, but if you have to learn docker and linux to use Casaos, might as well run proxmox too right ? as for me, Casaos is wayyy harder than things like [https://yunohost.org](https://yunohost.org), so it doesn't really fill the gap. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fantastic-Schedule92 · 2023-11-16 14:22 I've been using casaos for a few months now, but there are zero problems. I just package apps I need in a custom repo, mostly use it for the nice ui ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Kir-01 · 2023-11-17 09:43 I started using CasaOS because I did not know ANYTHING about self- hosting and docker, and it really helped a lot. It was also great to learn about docker and services bit by bit, while giving me the opportunity to have a funcioning system since day 1. Honestly, I loved it. Of course, if you know your way around docker from the start, it is probably useless for you. And I have to admit that now that I know a bit or two, it's starting becoming an obstacle on the way of abandoning it. But we'll see. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless-Surround-71 · 2023-11-17 14:31 I too learnt docker with casa, but in my case I think it made me learn slower. I think that if I learnt docker on cli or portainer only, i would have understood more quickly all the things docker. But i really agree with you about the day 1 functioning system, it's what makes great for beginners I think.