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After the setup is done, most days you only open a service and use it. This page covers the small things that come up.

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Open your services

  1. Open the Node Hub at the base.<domain> address from setup. With the default domain, this is base.home.test.
  2. Click the service you want. Every service has its own address under the same domain.
  3. If a page asks you to sign in, sign in with your local identity.
Bookmark the Node Hub on every device in your household. Only the services you selected are listed there.

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Use it from a phone or another computer

The address must resolve on that device. On a device inside your home network, this works the same way as on your first computer. If a service opens on one device but not on another, the second device is not using the name resolution that your homelab needs. See Troubleshooting. For the apps on your phone, follow the guide of the use case, for example Photos from your phone or Password manager apps.

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Reach it from outside your home

By default your homelab is reachable inside your network only. If you want a public https:// name for a service, read kombify.me. Publishing is a choice you make per service. A service that is not exposed stays unpublished.

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Keep it healthy

Once in a while, from the folder ~/my-homelab:
verify checks that the stack still matches what was applied. drift detect tells you whether something was changed outside StackKits. Save the output next to the workspace so you can compare it later. See Operate a StackKit.

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Change something

Never edit the generated files. Edit the StackSpec, check the plan and then apply it. The steps are in Review a plan and apply.

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Make a habit of backups

Back up before every larger change and practice a restore now and then. See Back up and restore.