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“The Cloud” is a synonym for the Internet, and it’s evolved into the place where we do most of our computing. Instead of relying on services that can sell or expose your data, let’s see what it takes to make your own private cloud service.
If you want to follow along with this project here is a list of parts you will probably need to order:
Here is a list of other parts and tools that you you will probably find around the house (as I did):
While there are several free software platforms out there to create your own personal cloud, a well known open source platform is OwnCloud. Owncloud can run on Windows, Mac and Linux, so you can install it on virtually any computer you have laying around. You can find instructions for installation on the Owncloud website.
The option I have chosen is to install Owncloud on a Raspberry Pi, mainly because it is power and space efficient (not to mention super cheap). You could download and install Owncloud on from their website onto your Pi, but an easier option would be to download the Raspberry Pi Owncloud Image (click the download link above), thanks to the guys over at OwncloudBook.
Once you have the image downloaded, you need to burn it to an SD Card. If you are a Windows user, you can download Win32DiskImager to burn the image to your card. Otherwise, raspberrypi.org has some good guides for burning the image on other platforms.
Whenver the image is finished burning, plug the SD card into your Raspberry Pi along with power, internet, monitor, mouse and keyboard. Once it boots up, you need to follow these steps:
address 192.168.0.53
netmask 255.255.255.0
gateway 192.168.0.1
If you want to access your OwnCloud from “the cloud” and not just from you’re home network, you will need to set up port forwarding on your home router. If you need help with that you can watch this video. But what if you don’t want all of these services? What if you just want to make a Dropbox style cloud service that you can upload your files to? Well then you can watch this Tinkernut Labs video for how to make a Raspberry Pi NAS.
