Best way to remotely access TrueNAS/Nextcloud remotely?
Total noob, but I set up TrueNAS/Nextcloud on an old laptop and it's working great locally.
What would be the easiest secure way to access my files remotely from my phone and/or laptop?
Vpn.
Openvpn or wireguard.
My recommendation would be some kind of VPN. If your looking for something plug and play and free, look into zerotier.
If your home internet connection sits behind CGNAT, like me, just buy a cheap vps and set up your own wireguard network.
Both solutions avoid exposing your services directly to the public internet which reduces attack vectors and adds an extra layer of encryption.
Idk what CGNAT is tbh so I doubt it.
Other comment mentioned OpenVPN, would you say Zerotier is an easier option?
CGNAT = Carrier Grade Network Address Translation. It makes it practically impossible to open ports to the public internet and in some extreme instances make zerotier very unstable. Typically you only have CGNAT if your internet connection is 4G or fixed wireless.
OpenVPN is just a VPN protocol. Roughly comparable to wireguard. It has been the gold standard for VPN technology for the past decade or so. Wireguard by comparison is much newer, and lighter to run. This typically results in faster throughput from a computational standpoint and devices where power is limited (cell phones), uses much less power by leveraging modern CPU encryption methods.
If you have the option to port forward on your home internet connection, its possible to setup a VPN connecting in a straight shot from your home to your roaming device. If you can't port forward, you will need a main in the middle (the VPS) to establish and route the connections through.
Zerotier works off of a PTP style network and the free plan allows up to 50 devices when last I checked. I'm not sure on the availability of zerotier or wireguard on truenas as the last time I used TrueNAS was Scale 22.
It is a NAT, but created by an operator. The operator does not give you a real IP address, but instead hides you behind his own NAT and gives you one private address.
I had literally just set this up on my truenas instance yesterday (even though I've been using ZeroTier for some time). The key thing to recognize is that truenas whipes out any modifications to its system after a reboot, hence the need for this script.
https://alan.norbauer.com/articles/zerotier-on-truenas
I've heard great things about tailscale, but just have had an opportunity to try it.
Would probably setup something like Pivpn on the server
Edit: Grammar
TrueNAS has an OpenVPN plugin available, which is typically the recommended option.
If you are using Scale, it has been depreciated. Rather inconvenient for me as I have to come up with a new solution.
Yea, I didn't like that they are going to drop support in the next version or whatever. Not sure if it's their intended replacement, but Wireguard is installed by default in TrueNAS Bluefin. I recently switched to that, and I find the performance is way better than OpenVPN.
Cloudflare zero trust tunnel might be up your alley. Look into that. It’s free but has privacy concerns so do your homework.
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I've seen in this thread:
| Fewer Letters | More Letters |
|---|---|
| CGNAT | Carrier-Grade NAT |
| IP | Internet Protocol |
| NAT | Network Address Translation |
| VPN | Virtual Private Network |
| VPS | Virtual Private Server (opposed to shared hosting) |
5 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 8 acronyms.
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Tailscale. Download it and you'll be up and running in 5 minutes. Don't use cloudflare tunnels unless you plan on opening it up to the public. Then you can go that route.
Second on that. The whole "it just works" slogan was frustrating when it didn't work at first, but once it finally for running it was great
What exact route did u advertise? I'm having trouble getting it working
Hey, I'm testing it and I have it installed on my phone/PC/TrueNAS but having trouble getting access remotely (testing on data).
I think I have the part "Advertise Routes" wrong, how to I know what IP to put in exactly
You put the ip address that tailscale gives you along with the port number of your NextCloud instance.
For restricted access, I add a Cloudflare Application in front of the Tunnel to provide authentication. Work's like a charm, and the user never hits my services unless they successfully authenticate.
Yes I do that too with email authentication. But if he is using a personal server with no users then there is no need for that.