Home Lab Applications and Services
This book documents the services, configurations, and infrastructure deployed in my home lab. Built on Proxmox VE, this environment allows me to test, deploy, and manage enterprise-like systems, including identity platforms, monitoring tools, collaboration apps, and file services.
Each section covers installation, configuration, and use case documentation to centralize my learning and provide technical transparency for future reference.

Audiobookshelf Installation via Proxmox VE Helper Scripts
Audiobookshelf is a self-hosted audiobook and podcast server with a web UI and apps. This guide shows how to deploy it in an  LXC container using the  Proxmox VE Helper-Scripts . 

 🧰 Step-by-Step Instructions 

 To create a new Proxmox VE Audiobookshelf LXC, run the command below in the Proxmox VE Shell. 

 bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/community-scripts/ProxmoxVE/main/ct/audiobookshelf.sh)" 

 Location of config file: /usr/share/audiobookshelf/config 

 This launches an interactive installation wizard for Audiobookshelf . 

 Fill in the Prompts 

 You'll be asked to confirm settings for: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Prompt 

 Recommendation / Example 

 

 

 

 

 Container ID 

 905 (or any available ID) 

 

 

 Hostname 

 e.g. audiobookshelf 

 

 

 Network Bridge 

 vmbr0 (default for most setups) 

 

 

 Static IP Address 

 e.g. 172.30.0.x 

 

 

 Gateway IP 

 e.g. 172.30.0.x 

 

 

 Storage Location 

 e.g. local-lvm 

 

 

 Enable Root SSH Access 

 Optional (yes for remote CLI access) 

 

 

 Media Folder Mount Point 

 Mount your media library or keep the default 

 

 

 

 

 Access Audiobookshelf Web UI 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 http://<your-static-ip>:13378 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Transfer File to the Audiobookshelf server: 

 

 

 

 scp "File path" user@<IP of the server>:/<Media Folder/

BookStack Installation on Ubuntu 24.04
📄 Description: 

 This page documents the complete process for installing BookStack , a self-hosted wiki and knowledge base, on a fresh Ubuntu 24.04 server using PHP, Nginx, and MariaDB. This service is used as my primary knowledge repository. 

 ref. https://www.bookstackapp.com/docs/admin/installation/ 

 ✅ Prerequisites 

 

 

 Fresh Ubuntu 24.04 LTS server (minimal install) LXC 

 

 

 Root or sudo access 

 

 

 Static IP address 

 

 

 Ubuntu 24.04 Installation Script 

 A script to install BookStack on a fresh instance of Ubuntu 24.04 is available. This script is ONLY FOR A FRESH OS it will install Apache, MySQL 8.0 & PHP 8.3 and could OVERWRITE any existing web setup on the machine. It also does not set up mail settings or configure system security, so you will have to do those separately. You can use the script as a reference if you’re installing on a non-fresh machine. 

 Running the Script 

 # Ensure you have read the above information about what this script does before executing these commands.

# Download the script

wget https://codeberg.org/bookstack/devops/raw/branch/main/scripts/installation-ubuntu-24.04.sh

# Make it executable

chmod a+x installation-ubuntu-24.04.sh

# Run the script with admin permissions

sudo ./installation-ubuntu-24.04.sh 

 The script will output a log file for debugging within your current working directory when running the script. Permissions for the BookStack installation files & folders will be set based on the user used to run the script. 

 ✅ Change your BookStack instance URL 

 1.  Set up a domain name (DNS) 

 Make sure that wiki.example.com points to your server's public IP address (private/internal). In my case, I used Cloudflare tunnel. 

 2. Configure BookStack's .env 

 Edit the BookStack environment file to reflect the new domain: 

 sudo nano /var/www/bookstack/.env 

 Update this line: 

 APP_URL=https://wiki.example.com 

 Then restart the web server: 

 sudo systemctl restart apache2 

 ✅  Set up HTTPS with Let's Encrypt (Optional but Recommended) 

 Install Certbot: 

 sudo apt install certbot python3-certbot-apache

sudo certbot --apache -d wiki.example.com 

 

 It will automatically get and install the SSL certificate. 

 ✅ Step-by-Step Mail Setup 

 1. Edit the .env File 

 Open the BookStack environment config: 

 sudo nano /var/www/bookstack/.env 

 Look for or add the following section: 

 MAIL_DRIVER=smtp

MAIL_HOST=smtp.example.com

MAIL_PORT=587

MAIL_USERNAME=your@email.com

MAIL_PASSWORD=your_password

MAIL_ENCRYPTION=tls

MAIL_FROM_ADDRESS=your@email.com

MAIL_FROM_NAME="BookStack" 

 🔁 Replace the values depending on your email provider. 

 2. Clear the config Cache (optional but recommended) 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 cd /var/www/bookstack

php artisan config:clear

PairDrop Installation via Proxmox VE Helper-Scripts
This guide covers installing PairDrop in an LXC container using the community-built Proxmox VE Helper-Scripts . These scripts make deploying apps like PairDrop fast, standardized, and repeatable. 

 🧰 Step-by-Step Instructions 

 

 To create a new Proxmox VE PairDrop LXC, run the command below in the Proxmox VE Shell. 

 

 bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/community-scripts/ProxmoxVE/main/ct/pairdrop.sh)" 

 This command runs a script that launches an interactive menu for installing PairDrop in a container. 

 Follow the Installation Prompts 

 The script will guide you through a series of options. Typical options include: 

 

 

 Set  container ID (e.g. 904 ) 

 

 

 Choose  hostname (e.g. pairdrop ) 

 

 

 Select a  static IP address (e.g. 172.30.0.x ) 

 

 

 Confirm  bridge interface (e.g. vmbr0 ) 

 

 

 Choose container  storage (e.g. local-lvm ) 

 

 

 Set  root password 

 

 

 Enable optional features (SSH, nesting, etc.) 

 

 

 Wait for the Script to Finish 

 Once confirmed, the script will: 

 

 

 Download the latest Debian 12 template 

 

 

 Create the LXC container 

 

 

 Install Docker inside the container 

 

 

 Deploy the PairDrop Docker container 

 

 

 Access the PairDrop Web Interface 

 Once complete, open your browser and go to: 

 http://<your-static-ip>:3000

Paperless-ngx Installation on Debian 12 (Using Official Script)
Paperless-ngx is a document management system for indexing, OCRing, and organizing scanned documents and PDFs. This guide walks you through setting it up on Debian 12 using the official installation script via Docker Compose. 

 Paperless provides an interactive installation script to set up a Docker Compose installation. The script asks for a couple of configuration options and will then create the necessary configuration files, pull the Docker image, start Paperless-ngx, and create your superuser account.  

 🐳 1. Install Docker & Compose (Debian12) 

 # Add Docker's official GPG key:

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install ca-certificates curl gnupg lsb-release

sudo install -m 0755 -d /etc/apt/keyrings

sudo curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/debian/gpg -o /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.asc

sudo chmod a+r /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.asc

# Add the repository to Apt sources:

echo \

 "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture) signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/docker.asc] https://download.docker.com/linux/debian \

 $(. /etc/os-release && echo "$VERSION_CODENAME") stable" | \

 sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list > /dev/null

 

sudo apt-get update

# Install Docker $ Compose plugin

sudo apt-get install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io docker-buildx-plugin docker-compose-plugin

#Enable and Start Docker

sudo systemctl enable --now docker

sudo service docker start 

 📦 2. Run the Official Paperless-ngx Installation Script 

 Download and run the setup script: 

 bash -c "$(curl --location --silent --show-error https://raw.githubusercontent.com/paperless-ngx/paperless-ngx/main/install-paperless-ngx.sh)" 

 

 Follow the prompts. 

 

 🌐 4. Access the Interface 

 Once complete, go to: 

 http://<your-server-ip>:8000 

 📚 Reference 

 

 

 📄 Official GitHub Repository: https://github.com/paperless-ngx/paperless-ngx 

 

 

 📘 Docker Installation Guide: https://docs.docker.com/engine/install/debian/ 

 

 

 📖 Paperless-ngx Documentation: https://docs.paperless-ngx.com/

Snipe-IT Installation on Ubuntu 24.04
This guide explains how to install  Snipe-IT , a self-hosted IT asset management system, on Ubuntu 24.04 using Nginx , MariaDB , and PHP 8.3 . 

 Ref. https://snipe-it.readme.io/docs/installation 

 📦 1. Update the System 

 sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y 

 🌐 2. Install Required Packages 

 Install Nginx, PHP, MariaDB, and all required PHP extensions: 

 sudo apt install nginx mariadb-server php-bcmath php-common php-ctype php-curl php-fileinfo php-fpm php-gd php-iconv php-intl php-mbstring php-mysql php-soap php-xml php-xsl php-zip git -y 

 ⚙️ 3. Install Composer 

 sudo apt install composer -y 

 🛢️ 4. Create the Snipe-IT Database 

 sudo mysql 

 Inside the MySQL shell: 

 CREATE DATABASE snipeit;

GRANT ALL ON snipeit.* TO 'snipeit'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'yourStrongPassword';

FLUSH PRIVILEGES; 

EXIT; 

 📁 5. Download Snipe-IT 

 cd /var/www/html 

sudo git clone https://github.com/snipe/snipe-it 

cd snipe-it 

 ⚙️ 6. Create and Configure  .env File 

 sudo cp .env.example .env 

sudo nano .env 

 Edit the following variables: 

 APP_URL=http://your-server-ip 

DB_DATABASE=snipeit 

DB_USERNAME=snipeit 

DB_PASSWORD=yourStrongPassword 

 🔒 7. Set Permissions 

 sudo chown -R www-data: /var/www/html/snipe-it 

sudo chmod -R 755 /var/www/html/snipe-it 

 🧱 8. Install Dependencies with Composer 

 sudo composer update --no-plugins --no-scripts 

sudo composer install --no-dev --prefer-source --no-plugins --no-scripts 

 🔑 9. Generate App Key 

 sudo php artisan key:generate 

 Make sure you keep a copy of your APP_KEY in a safe place, for example, a secure password manager. This key is required to decrypt any encrypted fields in the database. 

 🧠 10. Check PHP FPM Version 

 sudo systemctl list-units --type=service | grep php 

 Ensure PHP 8.3 (or the current version) is installed and running. 

 ▶️ 11. Enable PHP-FPM 

 sudo systemctl start php8.3-fpm 

sudo systemctl enable php8.3-fpm 

 

 

 

 🌐 12. Create Nginx Configuration for Snipe-IT 

 sudo nano /etc/nginx/conf.d/snipeit.conf 

 

 Paste the following (adjust IP and PHP version if needed): 

 

 server {

 listen 80;

 server_name 10.0.0.7;

 root /var/www/html/snipe-it/public;

 

 index index.php;

 

 location / {

 try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$query_string;

 }

 

 location ~ \.php$ {

include fastcgi.conf;

 include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;

 fastcgi_pass unix:/run/php/php8.3-fpm.sock;

fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+\.php)(/.+)$;

 fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;

 include fastcgi_params;

 }

} 

 🔗 13. Enable the Site 

 sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/conf.d/snipeit.conf /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/snipeit.conf 

 ⚙️ 14. Update Nginx Config 

 Edit main config: 

 sudo nano /etc/nginx/nginx.conf 

 Add the following line  inside the http block : 

 server_names_hash_bucket_size 64; 

 

 

 

 🔄 15. Restart Nginx 

 sudo systemctl restart nginx 

 🌐 16. Access Snipe-IT Web Interface 

 Open your browser and go to: 

 http://your-server-ip 

 Complete the web-based setup to finish the installation.