Home Network V1

OVERVIEW

The overall plan was simple here, to build out my knowledge on networking and Linux. I purchased a used 2014 Mac Mini with an Intel I5 and 8gb of RAM and that was my starting point.  

GOALS

  1. Remove OSX and replace with a stable Linux distribution, Fedora in this case
  2. Host as many services as I can on-prem 
  3. Learn what I can about Network Services and Linux

SPECIFICATIONS

2014 Mac Mini with an Intel I5, 8gb of RAM and a 256gb SSD. The Mac Mini was connected by ethernet to a T-Mobile provided AC-1900 Router, which provided wireless access for devices in the home. The AC-1900 also provided a wired connection to a handful of devices that operate better on wired connections.

MILESTONES

Converting the Mac to Fedora

Moving from OSX to Fedora on the Mac Mini was the first milestone after obtaining the hardware. First I needed to be certain Fedora would run without issue. I had used Fedora on an older Macbook Pro at one point and found that it would go into sleep mode and never wake up, even if the option to sleep was disabled. I did not encounter this issue with Fedora on the Mac Mini and moved onto integrating with the existing router.

Self Hosting DHCP

Once the Mac Mini was in place, the next step was moving it to more of a server role on the network. The first service to get up and running was DHCP using DHCPD within Fedora. Self hosting DHCP allowed me to learn the ins and outs of DHCP and have a bit more control over my network. After DHCPD was running, I was able to swap disable DHCP on the AC-1900 router and move to the next step.

Docker / Remaining Services

With DHCP running, I added Docker to the server, decreasing the time needed to bring the rest of services online. Using Docker Containers, I deployed the following services:

-Adguard for self hosting secure DNS and network wide ad blocking

– Fail2ban to block inbound traffic based on activity

-Twingate for zero trust remote access

-Wazuh (complete with agents on local machines) for monitoring

-UpTime Kuma to monitor certain external services and Docker Containers