I’m looking for something to replace cloud storage for myself and family. I’ve tried to use/like NextCloud but honestly I despise it. The UI/UX really bothers me, and administering it is a pain. It also just does way more that I want or need.

What I’m looking for:

  • Supports a virtual/sync folder on Mac. Like iCloud does, it needs to create a local folder on a Mac. I personally just use SMB, but for family members that’s not as easy (see next point).
  • Accessible from the internet. I don’t want to put my family members on the VPN, but I do have a central OAuth for other stuff so I want it to be secured with behind that.
  • Doesn’t need to have a web interface or phone app. If it integrates into the computer, it doesn’t really need this. I can just use (FileBrowser)[https://filebrowser.org/]. It’s mostly used for documents and the like, so desktop/laptop use is the most important.

Anyone use anything that fits this? Or anyone in general dislike NextCloud and use something else?

Edit: Maybe I can just setup webdav and use something like https://mountainduck.io/? Would be better to find something FOSS though, if possible.

  • Uninvited GuestEnglish
    6•9 months ago

    Does Seafile store data in a flat file, or as files/folder hierarchy on disk?

    • @nopersonalspaceOPEnglish
      7•9 months ago

      Okay I’m trying out seafile and it seems awesome, so maybe that will be the way to go.

      It stores them in a custom format in blocks, which is the only real downside because that means it can’t interop with things like FTP or SMB

      • @[email protected]English
        2•9 months ago

        I haven’t tried it but it can theoretically support webdav. You can also mount it read only via fuse with a bit of effort.

        Those are both on my list of things to experiment with. I love the speed but I miss the real files of NextCloud.

      • @[email protected]English
        1•9 months ago

        It does allow you to found the files, just not via smb or ftp. It requires it’s own filesystem but works very well.

        https://manual.seafile.com/extension/fuse/

        I’ve tested this on my backups for which I use borg backup.

        First I mount a remote borg repository using one command. Then mount the seafile repository via the fuse command above.

        Note that the sea drive client app does the same thing as above but in the gui and mounts the library as a virtual hard drive.

        https://help.seafile.com/drive_client/drive_client_for_win10/

        This is different than the actual seafile client app which is the standard folder sync / Dropbox like behavior that most users will only ever use. All the other things I mentioned above are for advanced use cases only and not normally needed but very nice to have.

        BTW authentik for Single sign on works super well

        • @nopersonalspaceOPEnglish
          2•9 months ago

          Oh this is huge. Just tested that out and it’s very cool. I need to figure out how to host it properly behind my reverse proxy though. Seems like it has nginx build in but that’s conflicting I think with my traefik that I put everything behind…

          • @[email protected]English
            1•9 months ago

            Om using it with traefik and don’t havr anything special other than my standard traefik labels that i put on all docker containers.

            Make sure you have added this to the config: https://forum.seafile.com/t/csrf-verification-failed-error-after-upgrading-from-ce-9-0-10-top-11-0-4/19257

            Also on first boot you might still have to login with the IP address and set the URL in the settings

            Afyer that it all worked well with traefik and authentik

            • @nopersonalspaceOPEnglish
              2•9 months ago

              Still having trouble, but it might be because the service itself is unhealthy because I cant connect even directly with the ip. Something I’ve learned already about Seafile that I don’t love: debugging it is a massive pain. Why TF are the config files spread out across like 15 different python files lol. Seems like a crazy setup to me.

              • @[email protected]English
                1•9 months ago

                Is this a fresh install? Why is there any debugging? To just connect with an ip requires no config files at all.

                I only changed 1 config file add the crfs URL and also added some lines for oAuth. No config file changes are needed by default. It’s all docker compose