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DreamServer Blog

Welcome to the DreamServer blog. Here we publish technical articles that help our customers (and anyone stopping by) get more out of our services and learn new things about dedicated servers, VDS, networking, applications and platforms. Plus the occasional announcement when we roll out promotions or new features.

Warpgate architecture: how the transparent bastion works

26 Jul 2026Bastion

Warpgate: the open-source bastion that brings order to your SSH access

A hands-on look at Warpgate, the self-hosted PAM bastion written in Rust: a transparent proxy for SSH, HTTPS, MySQL, Postgres and Kubernetes, 2FA and SSO out of the box, session recording, install on a VPS in minutes, and the limits to know before production.

Domain Monitor dashboard listing domains and their expiry dates

22 Jul 2026Network

Domain Monitor: never let a domain die from expiry you didn't see coming

Domain Monitor is a self-hosted PHP tool that tracks domain expiry, WHOIS data, and sends notifications over 7 channels, so you find out before the domain drops, not after.

Cronmaster web interface showing a list of cron jobs with live status

19 Jul 2026DevOps

Cronmaster: a decent web UI on top of the crontab you keep forgetting about

Cronmaster puts a modern web UI, live logging, and SSO on top of cron jobs, so you stop editing crontab with vi over SSH at 2am.

ArchiveBox web interface showing a list of archived snapshots

15 Jul 2026Archiving

ArchiveBox: self-hosted web archiving that actually beats link rot

ArchiveBox saves every URL as HTML, PDF, screenshot, WARC and more, all at once. We run it in our Bucharest datacenter to stop link rot before it costs us a source.

Network diagram with hosts discovered via ARP scanning, shown in a dashboard

12 Jul 2026Network

WatchYourLAN: knowing what's actually connected to your network, right now

WatchYourLAN scans your network via ARP and tracks every host it finds. We run it ourselves in our Bucharest datacenter, and here's how to install it.

OpenMediaVault web interface showing the disk and network administration panel

8 Jul 2026Storage

OpenMediaVault: a Debian-based NAS you run entirely from a browser

OpenMediaVault is a Debian-based NAS solution with SMB/NFS/FTP, software RAID and a plugin system. What it offers and why it wants dedicated disks, not a VPS.

Pterodactyl game server panel dashboard concept

5 Jul 2026Gaming

Pterodactyl: the game server panel that saves you from SSH-ing in every time someone wants to restart Minecraft

How Pterodactyl's Panel + Wings architecture gives game communities and hosting providers self-service control over Docker-isolated game servers.

Databasement: database backup dashboard

1 Jul 2026Backup

Databasement: self-hosted database backups, with schedules and restore

A hands-on look at Databasement, the open-source database backup manager: MySQL, Postgres, MongoDB and more in one web interface, with scheduling, retention, cross-server restore and S3 or SFTP storage. One container, self-hosted.

28 Jun 2026Cloud

Nextcloud: Your Own Dropbox, Minus the Vendor Lock-in

Nextcloud turns a VPS into a full file-sync and collaboration suite you control. What it is, how to install it with AIO, and when it's not the right tool.

Graylog log management platform

24 Jun 2026Observability

Graylog: Open Source Log Management That Doesn't Make You Grep Six Servers at 3am

A practical look at Graylog: architecture, streams, pipeline rules, alerting, a real docker-compose setup, and when it's the wrong tool for the job.

Sankey diagram in Akvorado: source, transit and edge

21 Jun 2026Network

Akvorado: see who is actually sending you traffic, flow by flow

A hands-on look at Akvorado, the open-source flow collector from Free: it receives NetFlow/IPFIX and sFlow, enriches with SNMP and GeoIP, stores in ClickHouse and draws Sankey diagrams. Peering, capacity and DDoS analysis, self-hosted.

17 Jun 2026Security

authentik: The Open-Source SSO Platform That Speaks SAML, OIDC, LDAP, and RADIUS

A practical look at authentik, the open-source identity provider with SAML, OIDC, LDAP, SCIM and RADIUS support, configurable flows, and forward-auth for any self-hosted app.

mkcert Web UI: local certificate management

14 Jun 2026Security

mkcert: local HTTPS with no browser warnings, in two commands

A hands-on look at mkcert, the tool that generates locally-trusted development certificates: how it installs a local CA into the trust store, how you issue a cert for any domain and IP, plus mkcert Web UI for teams. No self-signed, no browser warnings.

Grafana architecture: how it connects to data sources

10 Jun 2026Monitoring

Grafana: the single pane of glass for your whole infrastructure

A hands-on look at Grafana, the open-source visualization layer for monitoring: how it pairs with a metrics backend like VictoriaMetrics or Prometheus, dashboards-as-code, alerting, install on a VPS in minutes, and the limits to know before production.

Wazuh, open-source security XDR/SIEM platform

7 Jun 2026Security

Wazuh, Open-Source XDR and SIEM for When Grep Isn't a Security Strategy Anymore

Wazuh combines XDR and SIEM in one open-source platform: agents, FIM, intrusion detection, vulnerability scanning and compliance. When it's worth running.

3 Jun 2026Security

CrowdSec: Crowdsourced Intrusion Prevention for Everyone Else's Servers Too

CrowdSec brings collaborative, behavior-based intrusion prevention to your servers: what it does, how to install it, and where it honestly falls short.

Diagram of NetBox connecting devices, racks, and IP addresses in a network graph

30 May 2026Network

NetBox: the source of truth behind our own infrastructure (DCIM + IPAM)

How we use NetBox as our real CMDB and IPAM for our Bucharest datacenter, queried live by our own Ansible automation. Plus a VPS install guide.

Gatus dashboard showing the status of several monitored services

27 May 2026Monitoring

Gatus: health monitoring with config that lives in Git

How we run Gatus, an open source health dashboard, to watch dozens of services across our fleet, all defined in YAML and version-controlled in Git.

23 May 2026Control Panels

CloudPanel: a free server panel that does not feel cheap

A practical look at CloudPanel, the free open-source server control panel from MGT-COMMERCE: what is in the box, how it installs on a Debian or Ubuntu VPS, and where it stops short.

SafeLine WAF architecture: how it works

SafeLine WAF: a serious open-source firewall for your web apps

A hands-on look at SafeLine, the self-hosted WAF from Chaitin Tech: semantic detection engine, install on a VPS in five minutes, real configuration examples and the limits to know before you put it in front of production.

Uptime Kuma dashboard showing monitors and uptime status

16 May 2026Monitoring

Uptime Kuma: uptime monitoring without the headache

What Uptime Kuma is, what it monitors out of the box, what a public status page looks like, and how to install it on a VPS in a few minutes.

SmokePing graph showing the smoke band representing latency distribution and color-coded packet loss

13 May 2026Network

SmokePing: seeing the jitter and packet loss a plain ping hides from you

SmokePing measures and visualizes latency over time, with its signature smoke graph showing jitter and packet loss where a plain up/down check sees nothing.

Zabbix dashboard with graphs and a network map

9 May 2026Monitoring

Zabbix: enterprise-scale monitoring without the license bill

What Zabbix is, how it scales from 10 to 10,000 hosts through distributed proxies, what you get out of the box, and how to install it on a VPS.

Checkmk dashboard showing host and service status

6 May 2026Monitoring

Checkmk: infrastructure monitoring that configures itself

What Checkmk is, why its auto-discovery beats hand-written Nagios configs, what you get out of the box, and how to install it on a VPS. We run it ourselves.

2 May 2026Network

ZeroTier: when you need a virtual Ethernet switch, not just IP routing

ZeroTier emulates a Layer 2 Ethernet switch over the internet, with broadcast and multicast, where WireGuard's strict Layer 3 model falls short.

Diagram of a NetBird mesh network connecting multiple nodes over WireGuard

29 Apr 2026Network

NetBird: a peer-to-peer WireGuard mesh VPN with a fully self-hostable control plane

NetBird is a peer-to-peer mesh VPN built on WireGuard, with both the management and signal server fully self-hostable. What it offers and how to run it on a VPS.

25 Apr 2026Network

Tailscale: a mesh network on top of WireGuard, without hand-wiring tunnels

Tailscale takes the WireGuard engine and adds automatic key coordination, NAT traversal, and SSO. How it works, what's free, and where it stays a proprietary SaaS.

22 Apr 2026Network

WireGuard: the modern VPN that fits in a config file

WireGuard brings modern cryptography and a few thousand lines of code straight into the Linux kernel. Why it's different from OpenVPN/IPsec, and how we run it.

DreamServer blog

18 Apr 2026Announcements

Introducing the DreamServer Blog

We are starting a blog to publish promotions, campaigns, tutorials, recommendations and technical articles about the hosting services we run - dedicated servers, VDS, VPS and everything around them.

Trusted By & Member Of

We are proud members of leading internet infrastructure organizations.

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RIPE NCC

MANRS

PeeringDB

RoTLD

DSIX

SBIX

4IXP

LOCIX

Euro-IX