ADR-0001: Decision to Introduce a Self-Hosted Server Environment¶

Status¶

Accepted

Context¶

The HomeOps Platform aims to explore realistic development, deployment, and operational practices for a modular home-oriented software system. While early phases of the project focus on documentation, architecture, and isolated component development, later phases require a concrete runtime environment in which services can be deployed and operated.

At the time of this decision, no dedicated server environment existed. Development and experimentation were limited to local machines and external hosting solutions. This constrained the ability to reason about deployment practices, container hosting, operational concerns, and continuous delivery in a realistic manner.

To support future phases of the roadmap—particularly selective continuous deployment and operational monitoring, a stable and controllable deployment target is required.

Decision¶

A dedicated self-hosted server environment will be introduced as part of the HomeOps Platform.

The server will be operated in a headless configuration and treated as a foundational infrastructure component. Its primary purpose is to provide a realistic runtime environment for hosting backend services, containerized applications, and supporting platform components.

This decision does not mandate immediate automation or continuous deployment. Instead, the server is introduced as an enabling prerequisite for later phases of the platform’s evolution.

Rationale¶

Introducing a self-hosted server environment provides the following benefits:

Establishes a concrete and realistic deployment target
Enables experimentation with containerization and service hosting
Supports learning related to system operation, maintenance, and resource constraints
Reduces reliance on external hosting services for core platform components
Aligns with the platform’s emphasis on modularity and independent deployment units

By separating the introduction of the server environment from the introduction of CI/CD automation, the platform can evolve incrementally without prematurely increasing complexity.

Consequences¶

Positive¶

A stable foundation for future deployment and automation work
Improved understanding of operational constraints and trade-offs
Greater control over networking, storage, and runtime behavior
Clear separation between environment readiness and service readiness

Negative¶

Additional responsibility for system administration and maintenance
Manual provisioning and configuration in early stages
Potential limitations imposed by available hardware resources

These trade-offs are considered acceptable given the educational and exploratory goals of the project.

Future decisions regarding container runtime selection
Future decisions regarding observability and monitoring tooling
Future decisions regarding continuous deployment enablement
Future decisions regarding security hardening and access control
Future decisions regarding network segmentation and trust boundaries