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I'm putting this under security because i'd like to keep this a private server for family:
that said, I'm wondering if you fine people can help me with the best way to set up a web server in my house to host the files on my external hard drives for family members in other cities/countries while, again, keeping it private and secure over the internet.
I'm looking into ngrok for url handling, but am not sure exactly if this is the best way to go.
Can anyone save me time and possible heartache and failure and provide me (and possibly others) with a walk-through of which software to use. Would love to do something like free, but may have to get a paid unique domain from, say, ngrok, to make it easier for family members to connect up.
Help me, Obi Wan Kenobi... you're my only hope!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 20 2018, @06:04AM
SSH, but generate a few key pairs and allow key based authentication only in /etc/ssh/sshd_config. Add those public keys to your ~/.ssh/authorized_keys.
Then help or tell your friends and family how to setup Filezilla (cross platform FTP/SFTP client) with their new private key to access your files. They get one click connection, an easy to understand drag and drop interface between local and remote file lists, and interrupted download resume. It's a pretty easy to use, secure, and easy to setup system.
Also change your default SSH port number to something else and open that port on your router (don't worry it is a part of the Filezilla config so no-one has to remember it).
As for keeping track of your IP address: when I used to run a server like described above, I had a script that read my router status page, checked if the external IP had changed, and sent out an email accordingly. I don't remember the details but a search for "send gmail from bash" and someone else had laid it all out for me. Or just tell your users to email you if they lose access and you email them manually when you hear from them or you know your ip changed.