Category Archives: Network

Information related to networking.

AI and Machine Learning, General, Infrastructure, Network, Software Development

Something New – We’ve added a Blog!

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We have several new projects underway for our Home Lab and the services it provides. We’re adding a Home Lab Blog to share current projects and information! We are doing this to help our readers follow our progress and learn about our projects.

We are also enabling our readers to comment on our Blog. This enables us to answer questions and allows our readers to shape the direction of our Home Lab.

Projects We Are Working On

We have several new projects that we are working on, including:

  • An enterprise-level upgrade to our Core Network that enables high-availability and expanded capacity in our core network and Internet connectivity
  • Enhancements to our Proxmox Test Node to create a second 3-node high-availability Proxmox Cluster for staging and testing.
  • A new Artificial Intelligence-based Camera system
  • A rebuild of our fiber network to improve patching, capacity, and reliability
  • Several software development projects that use Artificial Intelligence and Agentic Engineering to create new applications
  • We are expanding our support for the Amateur Radio Emergency Data Network (ARDEN). This expansion covers the New England region in the United States.
  • Expanding our Home Automation Capabilities.

Project Previews

Here are a few images from our in-progress projects.

Enterprise-Grade Core Rack Upgrade
Enterprise-Grade Core Rack Upgrade
High-Availability Enterprise-grade Firewall and Aggregation
Next Generation AI Camera System
Next Generation AI Camera System
Equipment for Fiber Network Upgrades
Equipment for Fiber Network Upgrades

We hope that you’ll check our Home Lab Blog often and follow/comment on our progress!

Network

WireGuard VPN

WireGuard VPN
Our Unifi system can support several different VPN configurations. We used the VPN server built into our Unifi Dream Machine SE and configured it to use Wireguard clients on our iPhones, iPads, macOS laptops, and Windows laptops. The Unifi system makes setting up our WireGuard VPNs simple.

The following video explains the various VPN options and how to configure them.


5 Types of VPNs on Unifi and How To Configure Them

We use DDNS to ensure that our domains point to our router when our ISPs change our IP address. After the clients are installed, they are updated to point at our network’s current IP.

Docker, Network

Iperf3

Iperf3
Iperf3

Iperf3 is a common tool for network performance testing. We run an Iperf3 server in a Docker container. You can find information on how to set up and use Iperf3 here.

Docker, Network

Speedtest Tracker

Speedtest Tracker

We run a Docker container called Speedtest Tracker to monitor the performance of our Internet connection. This container is a self-hosted application that monitors the performance and uptime of our internet connection. It uses test servers on the Internet to measure our Internet upload and download speeds, latency, and jitter. The main use case for this tool is to build a history of your internet performance and ISP’s uptime so you can be informed when you’re not receiving your ISP’s advertised rates.

Setup and Configuration

This container is easy to set up in Docker. We used the process in the video below –

We also configured the container to store test results in our Influxdb.

Speedtest Tracker Grafana Dashboard

This allows us to configure a Grafana Dashboard to view the results of our tests.

Speedtest Tracker Results
Speedtest Tracker Results

The Grafana Dashboard that we used can be found here. You can learn more about how we have deployed and configured Grafana dashboard in our Home Lab here.