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Comment by Narretz | original | Talorys – A self-hosted personal AI agent on Cloudflare's free tier
[−]Narretz · 2026-10-10 Sat 12:15 UTC · link
Where do you draw the line? Some SaaS acceptable? VPS? Bare metal? Or your own server in your own home?
[−]vrganj · 2026-10-10 Sat 12:19 UTC · link
IMO physical hardware in your own material possession, so only the last of your examples.
[−]loveparade · 2026-10-10 Sat 12:24 UTC · link
I think it's a pretty clear line. Self hosted means you can run it locally in your home, using a saas platform or vps is just a convenience, not a requirement.
[−]pwython · 2026-10-10 Sat 13:44 UTC · link
What about FOSS SaaS alternatives that are meant for team collab? Like Plane (Jira replacement). Does that have to be ran locally at home for it to be considered "self hosted"?
[−]ajnin · 2026-10-10 Sat 14:34 UTC · link
Self hosted means you host it yourself. I.e. you run the software. Running on your own home machine is definitely self-hosted. Hosting it on a VPS in some datacenter still is. Running it in a cloud platform somewhere is stretching it but I'd say that sill is. SaaS definitely is not self hosting even if the software is open source. The important part is that you're the one in control of the software.
[−]paulddraper · 2026-10-10 Sat 18:08 UTC · link
If you run Plane on your hardware, then it is self-hosted.
[−]sigbottle · 2026-10-10 Sat 16:20 UTC · link
I think a VPS is acceptable because otherwise you just can't let the broader internet talk to you, then. The internet's structured that way.

I hope AI will push infra, including good-enough AI itself, dirt cheap, so that everyone has "good enough" software for themselves. Tailscale is a game changer in this regard but only the first step.

[−]Kudos · 2026-10-10 Sat 18:29 UTC · link
I don't have a VPS, I have a mini server in my house. I run bunch of publicly available services on it.
[−]sigbottle · 2026-10-10 Sat 23:30 UTC · link
I might be stupid but I thought normal consumer internet didn't expose stable IP addresses?
[−]sigbottle · 2026-10-10 Sat 23:39 UTC · link
never mind, ddns. huh.
[−]wredcoll · 2026-10-11 Sun 05:22 UTC · link
A surprisingly large number do, at least in america. They're not guaranteed to be stable, i.e. you don't "own" the IP but in practice I've found that buying a relatively high tier internet plan tends to come with IPs that change less than once a year.

This is probably considerably less true in countries with a smaller ip to population ratio e.g. india.

[−]kennethkl · 2026-10-11 Sun 00:11 UTC · link
you have to read between the lines.

the complaint is the communication, not the literal words. because the title conflicts with itself, it causes confusion.

for example, saying, "come join us. I'm hosting a dinner party. It's at this restaurant," would be similar.

[−]wredcoll · 2026-10-11 Sun 05:24 UTC · link
It's an interesting example because I think it proves the opposite point. There are places, large dense cities, where most people live in tiny apartments, and if you're having a dinner party it's not going to be inside a house.

It's perfectly reasonable and understandable to say you're hosting the party even if you don't own the physical location (see also: weddings)

[−]croes · 2026-10-10 Sat 13:44 UTC · link
[−]permalac · 2026-10-10 Sat 13:49 UTC · link
You should have the option to host it at home. Then you may choose to host in a vps. Must be vendor agnostic.
[−]Barbing · 2026-10-10 Sat 14:35 UTC · link
Agreed, in my mind it’s where the developer can’t unilaterally change your installation.
[−]nilamo · 2026-10-10 Sat 15:33 UTC · link
I think the line is obvious... If you can't unplug it, you're not self-hosting.
[−]speedgoose · 2026-10-10 Sat 15:45 UTC · link
I would personally draw the line a the data centres. If your infrastructure involves data centres, this is not self hosting. In my opinion.
[−]onel · 2026-10-11 Sun 11:19 UTC · link
Yeah, I think we need to better define this term. To an extent people, call self-hosting using your own server in your own home. But I think using a VPS from hosting provider should also be an acceptable term. That offers a lot of convenience that will keep self-hosting out of reach of a lot of people.