# Self-Hosting #1: setting up the machine > The reason why we can't have good things in life is because we use the wrong tools and force it to work. ## Preamble Normally, servers are built on pc hardware, be it old pc or dedicated raspberry pi-esque low power machine.

example of server — Rodzilla at English Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Such machines are easily upgradeable,
either by adding more storage (RAM and HDD/SSD)
or upgrading the processing power (CPU and GPU). In my home, there are few spare machines, to list few, there are: 1. A PC with Intel core 2 cpu and 6GB of ddr3 RAM and GTX 1050 2. A laptop with 8GB of RAM, 4000 series intel core i5 cpu. 3. Samsung Galaxy A tablet (Old) I chose the tablet. > There are many downsides to this path, so I don't recommend you follow my steps. I'm just recording my progress. --- ## Setting up the tablet for develepment ### stage 1. Thank Termux (for both the good, and bad) SM-p550 is an **Android** tablet, and Android, although Linux-based, doesn't really let you run it like one out of box.
So, you either need to go into the interweb spiral to get a Linux os for your hardware,
or get [*termux*, a terminal app with Linux environment](https://termux.dev/en/). Now you have a perfectly fine linux machine. (at least, for now) In termux, you can download the available packages for your dev environment, be it JS, Go or Elixir.
check [the wiki](https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Software) to learn what you can do (if you are following along) ### stage 2. ssh (dropbear) Termux is fascinating. until you try to use the virtual keyboard for navigation and actual coding.
So lets bring the development to my actual pc with the help of Secure Shell protocol(ssh). SSH, if you are not familiar, is: a protocol that help user to securely connect one machine to another through unsecured network. The good people maintaining the wiki has given us a guide line on how we can do that. [Remote Access](https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Remote_Access) In the guide, they give us two choices for SSH. One is openSSH(more popular, more features) and the other is Dropbear(less features, lighter) If my tablet was more recent, I would have used OpenSSH since that is what the guide recommends. However, My tablet only has 2 GB of RAM, and only about half of it is accessible. I need all the savings I can get, so Dropbear it is. So I followed the instruction ``` pkg upgrade pkg install dropbear passwd // setting up the password dropbear ``` and to check whether it worked, I went and tested it by typing `ssh 127.0.0.1` on termux. ``` ssh: Connection to user@127.0.0.1:22 exited: Connect failed: Connection refused ``` > ? say what now? I'll cut to the chase.
*Termux*, although very close to actual Linux, is an emulation over the android system. That limits the number of port that termux can access. ([source](https://blog.geggus.net/2018/06/a-sshd-on-port-22-hack-for-termux-on-android/))
Normally, SSH defaults to port 22. However, termux defaults ssh server port to 8022. It was written right on top of the guide, but I skipped through and missed it. So when I tried SSH with out port specified, what I have done was knocking on port 22, while the ssh server was waiting for me at port 8022. After learning more about the limitations, I was finally able to access the ssh server in termux from powershell of pc. `ssh ${lan ip of tablet} -p 8022` ### stage 3: Key instead of password (Windows strikes again!) Did you know that you can set up pubkey auth for SSH? Well you can with simple script like below: ``` ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 2048 -f id_rsa // prompt for passphrase // key generated ssh-copy-id -p 8022 -i id_rsa IP_ADDRESS ``` But wait, what's this?! ``` ssh-copy-id : The term 'ssh-copy-id' is not recognized as the name of a cmdlet, function, script file, or operable program. Check the spelling of the name, or if a path was included, verify that the path is correct and try again. At line:1 char:1 + ssh-copy-id + ~~~~~~~~~~~ + CategoryInfo : ObjectNotFound: (ssh-copy-id:String) [], CommandNotFoundException + FullyQualifiedErrorId : CommandNotFoundException ``` "Aw, you don't ssh-copy-id in powershell! That's a bummer." is a euphemism to how I felt when I saw that. So, I went online, found [this post](https://chrisjhart.com/Windows-10-ssh-copy-id/), and tried it. ``` type $env:USERPROFILE\.ssh\id_rsa.pub | ssh {IP-ADDRESS-OR-FQDN} "cat >> .ssh/authorized_keys" // resulted in error, so I checked the user/username folder and found id_rsa.pub in there. // So I changed the above to: type $env:USERPROFILE\id_rsa.pub | ssh {IP-ADDRESS-OR-FQDN} "cat >> .ssh/authorized_keys" // prompt for ssh password ``` and It worked. The public key was found in .ssh/authorized_keys file. I tried to ssh into the server, but then, it asked for my password again. Can you guess why? `ssh-keygen` is supposed to save the keys inside .ssh folder. But in my PC, it saved it outside of it.
When using pubkey auth in windows for ssh, windows check for the private key inside `.ssh` folder. In my case, there was none because they were in `user/username` folder, the parent folder of `.ssh`. After moving the keys into the `.ssh` folder, I finally accessed the ssh server without password. ### last stage: Make life easier by fixing things I'm a British Columbian and I use Shaw Internet. so accessing the router may be different if the two informations doesn't apply to you. #### Getting a static LAN ip for your machine 1. Open up a browser, and on the address bar, type in 10.0.0.1 and press enter. 2. If it's your first time accessing the router the credential is as followed:
Username : admin
Password: password 3. Click on `Connected Devices` in the left pane 4. Find the device that hosts the ssh server and click on edit. 5. Change the configuration to Reserved IP and set up a reserved IP Now you don't have to worry about ip changing. #### Making an alias to accessing the machine (powershell) It's an hassle to write down `ssh ip address -p 8022` everytime you try to access the machine. Instead, save it in your profile and give it short, but memorable alias. 1. open up powershell 2. `code $PROFILE` to open up VS code and edit the profile. (replace `code` with text editor of your choice) 3. add `function dropbear { ssh ip address -p 8022 }` and save. now you can use `dropbear` to access the machine! --- ### Postamble Now I have a machine that I can readily access and manipulate at will.
Next step is to get a website running on the machine. I'm thinking of getting a copy of this website(built with next) to run on it. However, One worry I have is the lack of memories in the machine.
Will a Next web app run in a memory-confined machine? Find out next time, next blog.