CloudHub is the private file service I built for my photos, documents and machine backups. Block-level incremental sync, end-to-end encryption, hourly snapshots — running since April 2023 on hardware I own. The long story is on the main blog.
Block-level dedup: after the first full pass, only deltas move. A typical workday's changes sync in under two seconds.
Files are encrypted with AES-256 before they leave the client. The server stores ciphertext; keys never leave my devices.
Web, desktop client and mobile, with offline caching and on-demand download for large libraries.
A snapshot every hour, retained for 90 days. Accidental deletions are a five-minute recovery, not a tragedy.
Every machine on the network drops its nightly restic backup into a dedicated quota. Verified by quarterly restore drills.
Expiring, bandwidth-capped external links for the rare times a file needs to go outside the network.
| Time (UTC+8) | Device | Change | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-11-14 08:31 | ThinkPad X1 | 3 new files (412 MB) | Operational |
| 2026-11-14 06:00 | iPhone 15 | 87 photos backed up | Operational |
| 2026-11-13 22:14 | Home NAS | Nightly full verification pass | Operational |
| 2026-11-13 09:12 | Mac mini | Documents delta, 24 MB | Operational |
| 2026-11-12 21:47 | ThinkPad X1 | Snapshot restore test (2026-11-01) | Operational |
curl -H "Authorization: Bearer $CLOUDHUB_TOKEN" \ https://api.5457090.xyz/v1/cloudhub/objects/photos/2026/11/
Requests go through the network's shared API gateway (api.5457090.xyz). Unauthenticated requests are rejected with 401 — the design notes are on the blog.
This service is one of several running on the 5457090.xyz domain. The rest of the fleet:
| Domain | Service | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| www.5457090.xyz | Main blog | Alvin's Notebook — long-form write-ups about this fleet |
| cdn.5457090.xyz | StaticHub | Static asset cache for every site on the network |
| api.5457090.xyz | API gateway | Shared JSON API facade for the network's services |
| mail.5457090.xyz | MailCorner | Self-hosted mail for the 5457090.xyz domain |
| git.5457090.xyz | GitNest | Self-hosted git hosting, read-only public clones |
| lab.5457090.xyz | Lab Notebook | Weekend experiments with downloadable datasets |
| dev.5457090.xyz | DevTools | Local-first developer tools, nothing leaves the network |