Self-Hosting for Developers: Setting Up a Complete Dev Environment

The Self-Hosted Dev Stack

Instead of paying for GitHub, CircleCI, Datadog, and a dozen other tools, run everything on a single server.

The Stack

Code Server (VS Code in the Browser)

Access VS Code from any device with a browser. Your extensions, settings, and terminal — accessible anywhere.

Gitea (Git Hosting)

Private Git repositories with pull requests, issues, and CI/CD. No per-repo fees.

Drone CI / Gitea Actions (CI/CD)

Automate builds, tests, and deployments. Container-native, fast, and lightweight.

PostgreSQL + Redis (Databases)

Development and staging databases. No cloud database fees.

MinIO (Object Storage)

S3-compatible storage for development. Test file uploads without AWS charges.

Uptime Kuma (Monitoring)

Monitor all your services and get alerts when something breaks.

Grafana + Prometheus (Observability)

Metrics dashboards for all your services. CPU, memory, request rates, error rates.

Why This Works

Total cost: $5-10/month on TinyPod vs $100-300/month for equivalent SaaS tools.

GitHub Teams ($4/user): replaced by Gitea ($0)

CircleCI ($30/mo): replaced by Drone CI ($0)

Datadog ($15/host): replaced by Grafana ($0)

AWS RDS ($15-50/mo): replaced by local PostgreSQL ($0)

Setting It Up

1. Deploy Gitea for Git hosting

2. Deploy Code Server for remote development

3. Set up Drone CI connected to Gitea

4. Deploy PostgreSQL and Redis for databases

5. Deploy Uptime Kuma for monitoring

6. Deploy Grafana + Prometheus for metrics

Each deployment takes 1-2 minutes on TinyPod. The entire stack is running in under 15 minutes.

Access from Anywhere

Every service gets a subdomain with HTTPS. Code from your laptop, tablet, or even your phone. Your development environment is always available.