How long does it take to set up Nextcloud for home users?
Store your documents, calendar, contacts and photos on your server or in the cloud of your choice with Nextcloud, self-hosted file storage software for home users.
nextcloud.com
Hi,
It depends how you would like to host your nextcloud. First I am going to provide you with some details:
There are 3 general ways to use NextCloud:
1- At home as a media/file center (offline)
In this way you will need to dedicate a machine (linux/freeBSD) to the nextcloud and define a hard drive or NAS as your file server. Then whenever you are connected to your network, you can use this file manager and sync your images taken by your phone or sync your files with your notebook.
Pros:
With this method you will have the maximum privacy and if you do not go online (getting a dedicated IP address and put your server on the internet) it will have the best security
Cons:
Maintenance. This is the most important and most difficult part of managing your own NextCloud instance. Specially when you should upgrade to the next major version.And please note that you will need a great knowledge of Linux and apart from the NextCloud you should keep your Linux and all it's packages updated.
My personal opinion: does not worth IF you do not have time or adequate Linux knowledge.
2- Hosting on your own Server (online)
In this case you will need to have your own server or cloud server and your service will be accessible via internet (obviously). Like the previous method will be in charge of the maintenance of your server and NextCloud.
Pros:
Since you are in charge, then relatively it will come with the highest privacy again. But you should consider the hosting service which you choose and also the country where the server is located. I personally would go for EU countries as they have better privacy practices and based on the law they are not allowed to access your data withour your allowance (unlike US, UK and Australia).
Cons:
Since you are in charge all the problems which I mentioned before will exist for this one as well. In addition security will be questionable. In my opinion will not be 100% reliable as basically a 24/7 monitoring service is always needed to keep all the services up and running. I did it for 1 year and it was extremely difficult.
And also since your service is online you should rethink about choosing your datacenter and the security practices which they do.
3- Go with a managed hosted service (online)
As a person who is looking for a reliable service and host all of his important files in the cloud in addition to the calendar, contacts and tasks, I would recommend this method. You should be careful of choosing the company which you go for though. I will provide you with more info about the service which I am using at the end.
Pros:
It is managed which means professional server admin teams are taking care of the updates of the OS and your NextCloud instance. The security will be rather high as this service is being maintained regularly via professionals whose job is this. And finally it will be the most reliable solution which you can also be the admin and define users.
Cons:
The most important con (which is actually not a con) is being careful while choosing the provider. As I mentioned I would recommend an EU service provider. Enabling the server side encryption would be advised.
Final words:
I am getting my service from a sister company of ours. Obviously I trust them as I know that they are hosting their servers in the biggest datacenter in Germany and they are having great practices when it comes to the data protection and privacy laws. The company is located in Austria which has one of the most sensitive privacy laws in the Europe. In Austria there is no tolerance towards data protection laws and people can easily sue you if you do a small mistake (even by taking a small photo using your phone on the street).
I am even using NextCloud talk, which is an AMAZON replacement for ZOOM which has the worst security and privacy practices. I call my family and friends using this service which is literally hosted on my own NextCloud docker. To be honest it really feels good
. It also comes with complete screen sharing (like zoon) and group calls with no need of an account for the people which you are calling. You just need to create a public link and share it with them.
We are negotiating with this company to get a reseller account from them, but no news so far and if you are interested I can inform you if we get their partnership and can offer their services with discounted prices for MT.com.
If you have any questions I will be happy to answer.
All the best,
Al