openmega.net

Notes on IT infrastructure and home-lab engineering by Ibrahem KM.

An Information Technology site for IT professionals, system administrators, home-lab builders and technical users. Topics include Windows Server, virtualization, networking, zero-trust access, backup, logging, monitoring, and patch management.

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Latest notes

• 2026-10-22Remote access to a home lab without opening the front door
  Keep management on a private VPN, publish only what needs public access, and treat remote access as a series of decisions.
• 2026-10-07Zero-trust access for a home lab
  Publish self-hosted apps through identity-aware access and outbound tunnels instead of port forwards.
• 2026-10-07A practical Hyper-V backup strategy
  Plan VM backups around recovery goals, separate copies, and tested restores.
• 2026-10-07Centralised logging with Loki and Grafana
  Collect Windows and Linux logs with useful labels, durable delivery, and focused alerts.
• 2026-10-07Patch management for small estates
  Build a patch process with inventory, a test ring, windows, and reporting.
• 2026-10-07Remote Desktop Gateway basics
  Understand gateway policies, HTTPS transport, and safer remote desktop exposure.
• 2026-10-07Windows Server Core vs Desktop Experience
  Choosing between Core and Desktop Experience for workloads, with practical trade-offs for small environments.
• 2026-10-07VLANs for a home lab
  Use VLANs to separate traffic in a home lab, from basic concepts to inter-VLAN routing.
• 2026-10-07DNS hygiene for small networks
  SPF, DKIM, DMARC, DNSSEC, and record hygiene for small networks that send email and run services.
• 2026-10-07Monitoring what matters
  Alert on meaningful change, deduplicate, and avoid alert fatigue in small environments.
• 2026-10-07Documenting your infrastructure
  Build an inventory, write runbooks, keep a change log, and treat documentation as living work.