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ALPHA LAB
personal infrastructure · self-hosted

Self-hosted.
Always on.

ALPHA LAB is the personal infrastructure running local AI, services and data from home, with no rented cloud. It only becomes visible to the world through what gets deliberately published.

See the project Enter the Lab →
01 The Project

Infrastructure, not a showcase.

ALPHA LAB started as a personal homelab and grew into the base for everything: local AI, self-hosted services, monitoring, and a game lab kept separate from the rest.

This landing page shows, in real time, a minimised sample of incoming connections: approximate country and city, device type and visit duration, without exposing operational detail.

Model
Self-hosted, no rented public cloud
Public access
Only via Cloudflare, with controlled publishing
Administration
Private network, kept apart from what's public
Location
Porto, Portugal
02 Architecture

From the outside in, every layer has a job.

Internet
Public entry point. No port opened directly to the router.
Cloudflare Edge
Single public entry point: TLS, proxy and controlled publishing of what's deliberately exposed.
Public
Services published deliberately, like this landing page.
Private
Administration and operations, reachable only over a private network.
ALPHA LAB
Internal boundary of the infrastructure. From here on, everything runs on its own network.
alpha-pi
Edge: DNS, observability and light automation.
alpha-m5
Compute: main workloads, 24/7.
ALPHANAS
Storage: media, backup and archive, kept apart from the active runtime.
administration designed to run over a private network, off the public path
03 Infrastructure

Every node has a job. None of them does everything.

alpha-m5
Compute / Workloads
Runs the main services and heavy workloads, including local AI, around the clock.
alpha-pi
Edge / DNS / Observability
Always-on lightweight node: internal DNS resolution, monitoring and low-power automation.
ALPHANAS
Storage / Media / Backup
Dedicated storage for media, backups and archival data, kept outside the fast runtime.
Network
Connectivity / Control
Links the nodes, separates public from private traffic, and keeps control over what goes in and out.
04 Engineering in Practice

Real examples, not a list of technologies.

ALPHA CORE
ContextNo operational base of its own to run the lab's services.
DecisionBuild an internal operational platform instead of relying on third-party dashboards.
ResultCentral operating point for ALPHA LAB, built around the real infrastructure.
ALPHA DRIVER LOG
ContextA concrete professional need for logging and reviewing driving data.
DecisionDesign and build a dedicated PWA, hosted on the lab's own infrastructure.
ResultA working product for a real use case, from design through to deployment.
Observability
ContextNo visibility into the real state of services, so failures went unnoticed.
DecisionActive monitoring, health checks and collectors wired to notifications.
ResultIssues surfaced and reported before they turn into silent incidents.
Backup & Recovery
ContextCritical data and services without consistent protection against loss.
DecisionAutomated backup pipeline with a defined retention policy.
ResultRestores tested on a case-by-case basis, not a fully validated, end-to-end disaster recovery strategy.
Media Infrastructure
ContextMedia acquisition and organisation handled manually, inconsistently.
DecisionAutomate and integrate acquisition, organisation, storage and delivery into one coherent chain.
ResultA consistent media flow, without repeated manual work.
Game Lab
ContextA game server (AzerothCore + Playerbots) with requirements that didn't fit Docker well.
DecisionRun it directly on Debian/systemd with MySQL, logically isolated from everything else.
ResultProof that not everything needs to be forced into the same infrastructure mould.
05 Principles

ALPHA LAB isn't built to impress. It's built to hold up.

01
Security first
No WAN ports opened for the sake of it. External access only through controlled publishing or a private network.
02
Stability before extras
Useful services, simple maintenance, fewer moving parts. The best upgrade is the one that breaks nothing.
03
Separation by function
Edge for light duties. Compute for heavy loads. Gaming kept isolated. Cold data off the fast runtime.
04
Real control
Self-hosting isn't about fleeing the cloud as a trend. It's about knowing where services run and who's in charge of them.
06 Live Telemetry

A live sample, not the main event.

This section shows, in real time, a minimised view of connections to this page, just to illustrate that the infrastructure behind it is real and active.

Telemetry

LIVE
0
Pings
0
Countries
0
Now
Waiting for the first connection...
No persisted history yet...
Loading 7D summary...

// what's collected

  • Approximate country and city, derived from IP (IP geolocation, not GPS).
  • IP partially masked before being stored.
  • Device type, operating system and browser, from the user-agent.
  • Approximate visit duration.
  • Data kept for 7 days, then automatically deleted.
07 Explore / Connect
Control Room

Enter the operational dashboard.

The landing page shows ALPHA LAB to the world. The dashboard is the private operational area, kept separate from this public page.

Enter the Lab →
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