Note by @fastfinge

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

Interesting stats from my single person instance. Right now it knows 194730 fediverse users, on 8799 instances. It stores 3652744 posts, and gets about 71000 new posts every day. The PostgreSQL database is about 10 gigs, but the compressed database dump I take as a backup is only 851 megs. It needs about 4 gigs of memory to be happy. Since starting this instance a few months ago, I've made 1255 posts.

Martin from Toronto @mcourcel@mstdn.ca

@fastfinge You have your own instance? Do you argue with yourself? Because that would be cool.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@mcourcel Nah, I just wanted to use my interfree.ca domain in my handle and that was the only way.

Andrew Hodgson @andrew@hodgson.io

@fastfinge @mcourcel Yeah I did similar for this reason. Are you running Mastodon or a lightweight alternative? I'm running Mastodon via Cloudron.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@andrew @mcourcel I’m running iceshrimp.net. It’s not really about lighter resource use, I just don’t want to contribute to the Mastodon monoculture on the fediverse; we know what happens when one software dominates. And when I was looking, Go To Social didn’t support push notifications.

Mira 🤞🇧🇬🇭🇺 @tardis@tardis.pw

@fastfinge @andrew @mcourcel Yeah, I think the push notifications for GTS is something to be implemented, but Enafore on the web still plays sounds when the browser is opened, so that works for the most part as far as notifications are concerned. But that's honestly not a deal breaker because this thing is awesome, simple and minimalist, and the most important, there is someone to do all that code, and it's not me. :P

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@tardis @andrew @mcourcel I use it mostly on my phone, so that doesn’t work for me.

Mira 🤞🇧🇬🇭🇺 @tardis@tardis.pw

@fastfinge @andrew @mcourcel Poor you. Well, I developed the habit of checking my app randomly, so even that is not a dealbreaker. I just know okay, there aren't any notifications, no rush for me to answer, so, keep your patience, also gives me more patience exercises or something.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@tardis @andrew @mcourcel As you can tell I don’t rush to answer my notifications lol

Mira 🤞🇧🇬🇭🇺 @tardis@tardis.pw

@fastfinge @andrew @mcourcel LOL, neither do I.

Andrew Hodgson @andrew@hodgson.io

@fastfinge @mcourcel Yeah one reason I went with Mastodon was it was what Cloudron supported which is the control panel I'm using on this server right now. I note you're using Cosmo which I haven't seen before and it consumes standard Docker images. How have you found that to use? Are you running any other apps with that or just your Iceshrimp instance?

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@andrew @mcourcel I’m running Lemmy, iceshrimp, readeck, miniflux, deluge, sonarr, lazy librarian, nzbget, flairesolver, vault warden, Joplin, openwebui, nvdaremoteserver, and ollama all on cosmos. I pay for the vpn and have my apps spread over five machines on three different domains. It all mostly just works.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@andrew @mcourcel The nice thing about cosmos is that it keeps in sync with docker and docker compose. So you can use the web UI for everything it supports, and revert to the command line for the more advanced bits. But what you did on the command line will be reflected in the UI.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@andrew @mcourcel Oh also IPFS, tor, Bluesky pds, sky bridge, and audiobookshelf. And everything I listed authenticates with my cosmos user account.

James Scholes @jscholes@dragonscave.space

@fastfinge How does the authentication bit work if each individual thing doesn't specifically know about Cosmos? @andrew

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jscholes @andrew Cosmos is an openid provider, so apps that support SSO integrate that way. The cosmos reverse proxy also passes authentication headers, and some apps support that. Worst case scenario cosmos can be configured to require authentication before proxying particular urls.

Andrew Hodgson @andrew@hodgson.io

@fastfinge @jscholes Yeah Cloudron does similar with the accounts it means that I only need to manage users in one place. I'm especially interested though in the multi-server support in Cosmo. How is Cosmo handling mail if at all?

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@andrew @jscholes Not at all. I let iCloud handle mail. I’m too cowardly to host my own email.

Andrew Hodgson @andrew@hodgson.io

@fastfinge @jscholes Yeah not looking to move mail but how is outgoing mail handled if at all?

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@andrew @jscholes You specify an smtp server for it to use.

Andrew Hodgson @andrew@hodgson.io

@fastfinge @jscholes Over those multiple servers are they all connected together through the Cosmos VPN as if they were all on the same network?

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@andrew @jscholes Yes. It’s just a fancy vpn that syncs accounts. Also, only one machine is accessible to the internet. It proxies requests for apps on other machines over the vpn.

Mira 🤞🇧🇬🇭🇺 @tardis@tardis.pw

@fastfinge Ha! Our gts database is smaller than your 10GB, and I have posted over half of the posts. I win! Wheeee! Haha. Good stats, but not as good as gts. :D

Alex Hall @alexhall@mastodon.social

@fastfinge I've sometimes wondered about hosting one. Is there any practical reason to do so? I completely get if it's just a fun IT thing to do. I know I could change small things like the character limit and whom I federate with, but are there any other, larger benefits?

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@alexhall So for me, I already had the interfree.ca domain, and I wanted my username on the fediverse to be the same as my email. Plus, I wanted to try out the iceshrimp.net server because it has some features I like. I also do enjoy my 8192 character limit, and knowing who I federate with and who I don't. It's also nice to know that if another server unfederates with me, it's directly because of something I did, not because they don't like my admin or whatever.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@alexhall Another reason to use something that isn't Mastodon is that it seems to only be Mastodon that insists on transcoding and compressing your uploaded audio.

Alex Hall @alexhall@mastodon.social

@fastfinge Thanks. I'm still not sure if I'll ever do it, but I do kind of like the idea of spreading my icantsee.me joke domain to more of the world.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@alexhall If you do, probably use Akoma or Go To Social. Iceshrimp.net is still in beta, and really only recommended for weird people who like fiddling with things.