Life outside the terminal
Servers, sensors and solder-side experiments — a homelab that never sleeps, where professional skills get stress-tested for fun.
brian@homelab:~$ ./status.sh
exit 024/7
Server Uptime
Proxmox node, always on
2TB
Storage Protected
RAID-1 mirrored array
0 B
Data Lost
since day one
18
Devices Managed
every lease assigned by me
Equipment
The gear that runs it
My daily driver, every build, container, and prototype starts here. VMs, Docker stacks and dev servers run side-by-side without flinching.
Dedicated test bench, disposable VMs and network experiments run here so nothing risky ever touches the main machine.
Self-hosted Proxmox node that virtualises the whole lab: media server, backups and dev services running 24/7 with RAID-1 resilience.
Primary canvas, with code, dashboards and camera feeds watched live while the lab runs.
Second screen keeps logs, metrics and automation dashboards visible without breaking focus.
Field display, plug in anywhere to inspect a server, debug hardware or demo a build on the go.
New daily typing board, RGB-lit and responsive, built for long coding marathons and late-night terminal sessions.
Types the thousands of lines that run this lab, with custom keybinds mapped for my most-used commands.
Current main mouse, 68g of featherweight precision for fast cursor work, long coding sessions and competitive play.
Workhorse pointer for long coding sessions and rapid-fire terminal work.
Lab backbone, every device on this network is managed by me: static leases, port forwarding and uptime monitoring.
Remote control for the lab, SSH sessions, automation triggers and live camera feeds from anywhere.
No-frills backup line for calls and texts while the smartphone is doing lab duty.
Hands-free calls and focus audio for deep work and long lab sessions.
Health and notification hub, alerts hit the wrist so nothing is missed mid-debug.
RAID-1 storage for backups and archives, with redundancy configured, tested and verified.
Reference shots for documentation, builds and project write-ups.
The heart of my IoT work, sensor networks, home automation endpoints and robot brains, all running custom firmware I wrote.
What I Build
Weekend deployments
Home Automation
The lab lights, locks and devices run on my own automation: phone presence detection switches rooms automatically, RGB scenes coordinate across multiple rooms, and voice commands control it all.
ESP32 endpoints · custom firmware · presence sniffing · REST hooks
Media & Backup Server
An always-on server streaming 4K to every screen in the lab while automated nightly backups protect 2TB of RAID-1 storage, with no data lost since day one.
Proxmox VE · RAID 1 · cron automation · self-hosted services
Robotics & Embedded
Line-following robots, drone prototypes and ESP32 automation systems, with firmware written from scratch, PID control and sensor fusion tuned by hand on the bench.
ESP32-WROOM · C/C++ firmware · sensors · bench debugging
On the Bench
Currently tinkering
ESP32 Sensor Mesh
Room-presence detection nodes feeding the automation engine over WiFi.
Proxmox Experiments
Cluster and failover drills on spare hardware, snapshots before every risky move.
Custom Firmware
Hand-rolled C/C++ for every endpoint in the lab, no stock sketches allowed.
“Every device in this lab tells a story, of late-night debugging, of breakthrough moments, of systems built to serve real life, not just demos.”