Open source · the stack under the stack
Repos I run on.
Almost everything on this site runs on somebody else's open source. These are the repos that earned a spot on one of my boxes, and what I actually use each one for. No affiliate links, no "top 10" padding. If it is on here, it is running, it is a daily tool, or I tried it and can tell you why I stopped.
If you only look at 12
The ones I would install again first on a blank box.
AI and agents
The agent layer. Most of what I build lately is some mix of these talking to each other.
- Running
openclaw /
openclaw
My everything-agent lives here. Email, shopping, phone calls, fleet checks, all from a chat thread.
Cloud box
- Running
paperclipai /
paperclip
Runs my agent company: six agents with roles, tickets and handoffs instead of one giant chat.
Cloud box
- Daily tool
anthropics /
claude-code
Daily driver. Most of this site, the fleet docs and the brain repo got written through it.
Every machine
- Daily tool
openai /
codex
Second lane. Codex builds a drop, Claude integrates and ships it.
Workstation
- Running
open-webui /
open-webui
Private chat front end for every model I pay for or run locally.
Homelab
- Running
BerriAI /
litellm
One OpenAI-shaped endpoint in front of all of them, so apps never care which model answers.
Homelab
- Running
ollama /
ollama
Local models on the lab GPU.
GPU VM
- Daily tool
Comfy-Org /
ComfyUI
Image and video generation on the workstation GPU. Node graphs beat prompt roulette.
Workstation
- Daily tool
THU-MAIC /
OpenMAIC
Turns a cert blueprint into an interactive class with AI teachers. My study lab.
Workstation
- Daily tool
jamiepine /
voicebox
Local voice cloning and TTS. It narrates my demo videos.
Workstation
- Running
vercel-labs /
agent-browser
A real browser an agent can drive without me babysitting a Selenium script.
Homelab
- Running
m1k1o /
neko
Shared browser in a container. I can watch the agent click, and take over when it gets stuck.
Cloud box
- Daily tool
openclaw /
gogcli
Google Workspace from the command line. How my agent reads and sends mail.
Business stack
What runs QuickIT and MadeForMeAI. All self-hosted, all open source.
- Running
twentyhq /
twenty
The hub. CRM, projects board, sales, newsletters. Four instances, two of them for paying clients.
Cloud boxes
- Running
n8n-io /
n8n
Glue for everything: lead intake, email, calls, nightly jobs. Two instances, one personal, one business.
Homelab + cloud
- Running
calcom /
cal.diy
Booking. The MIT community fork now that Cal.com went closed.
Cloud box
- Running
gitroomhq /
postiz-app
Social scheduling. Agents draft, I approve, Postiz posts.
Cloud box
- Running
docusealco /
docuseal
E-signatures for contracts without paying per envelope.
Cloud box
- Running
umami-software /
umami
Cookieless analytics on all four of my sites, including this one.
VPS
- Running
karakeep-app /
karakeep
Bookmarks with AI tagging. Where links go instead of 40 open tabs.
VPS
- Running
paperless-ngx /
paperless-ngx
Scanned mail and documents, OCRd and searchable.
Homelab
Infrastructure and identity
The plumbing. Edge, identity, secrets, overlay network. The stuff that has to just work.
- Running
tailscale /
tailscale
The overlay for the whole fleet, with two subnet routers so losing one box never cuts off the lab.
Everywhere
- Running
goauthentik /
authentik
SSO for two brands and the homelab. Social login, MFA, per-brand recovery email.
Homelab + cloud
- Running
traefik /
traefik
Edge proxy for the homelab. Labels in, routes out.
Homelab
- Running
caddyserver /
caddy
Edge for the cloud boxes. Automatic TLS and a config I can read.
Cloud boxes
- Running
Infisical /
infisical
Every app secret, pushed from the box it lives on. Nothing lives only in a .env.
Homelab
- Running
dani-garcia /
vaultwarden
Account logins. Bitwarden clients, my server.
Homelab
- Running
AdguardTeam /
AdGuardHome
LAN DNS, twice, so one reboot never takes the house offline.
Homelab
- Running
Garage
S3 for every CRM attachment. Replaced MinIO when upstream went quiet.
Cloud + homelab
- Running
getarcaneapp /
arcane
Docker UI across every box, when I want to look instead of type.
Cloud box
- Running
lejianwen /
rustdesk-server
Self-hosted remote desktop. The fork, on purpose: it answers client logins the stock server does not.
VPS
- Running
jetkvm /
kvm
Out-of-band console on the Proxmox host. BIOS changes from a browser.
Homelab
- Running
searxng /
searxng
Private web search for the agents. No API key, no rate limit surprises.
Three boxes
Monitoring and dashboards
How I know something broke before someone texts me.
- Running
grafana /
grafana
Dashboards and alerts to Discord. The Container DOWN rule stays strict on purpose.
Homelab
- Running
grafana /
loki
Logs from every box in one place.
Homelab
- Running
grafana /
alloy
The collector that ships them.
Homelab + cloud
- Running
TwiN /
gatus
Outside-in uptime checks from a box that is not in the lab.
VPS
- Running
gethomepage /
homepage
One tile per service. If it is not on Homepage, it does not exist.
Homelab
- Running
getwud /
wud
Tells me when an image has an update. I decide when to take it.
Homelab
Home, media and fun
The off-the-clock half of the lab.
- Running
immich-app /
immich
Family photos off Google, on my NAS, with face search that actually works.
NAS
- Running
home-assistant /
core
Smart home. Runs on the NAS so it survives a lab rebuild.
NAS
- Running
chrisbenincasa /
tunarr
Ten live TV channels built from my own library, with commercials. Plex tunes them like cable.
GPU VM
- Running
Sonarr /
Sonarr
TV library automation.
Homelab
- Running
Radarr /
Radarr
Same, for movies.
Homelab
- Running
seerr-team /
seerr
Family asks for a show here instead of texting me.
Homelab
- Running
Tautulli /
Tautulli
Who watched what, and when the server is actually busy.
Homelab
- Running
Yooooomi /
your_spotify
My real listening stats. The lanes on my music page are cut from it.
Homelab
- Running
koala73 /
worldmonitor
A global news and events wall. Fun to leave on a second screen.
Homelab
- Running
bilawalsidhu /
gods-eye-view
Live public data on a 3D globe. Flights, satellites, cameras.
Homelab
- Running
excalidraw /
excalidraw
Whiteboard for every network diagram before it becomes a real one.
Homelab
What my own stuff is built on
Frameworks under the projects on this site.
- Daily tool
withastro /
astro
This site. Static pages, content collections, zero JS unless a page asks for it.
- Daily tool
tailwindlabs /
tailwindcss
Styling here and on MadeForMeAI.
- Daily tool
expo /
expo
PocketOps, my Twenty CRM app on the App Store, built from a Windows box.
- Daily tool
mrdoob /
three.js
The 3D board in CrackTown and the desk in Life as Dustin.
- Daily tool
microsoft /
playwright
Screenshots, demo videos and the mobile audit this page came out of.
- Daily tool
cloudflare /
workers-sdk
Wrangler. Every push to this repo deploys through it.
- Daily tool
elgatosf /
streamdeck
Packing and validating my Stream Deck plugins for the Elgato Marketplace.
Skills and prompt kits
Small repos that change how the AI writes and draws.
- Daily tool
hardikpandya /
stop-slop
Runs on every piece of prose I publish. It is why this page does not sound like a chatbot.
- Daily tool
cathrynlavery /
diagram-design
Architecture and flow diagrams in my brand colors instead of default boxes and arrows.
- Daily tool
anthropics /
skills
The reference for writing my own skills: handoff, SEO pass, branded docs.
Tried and moved on
Good projects that did not stick for me. Part of the list on purpose.
- Tried
NousResearch /
hermes-agent
Ran it as an always-on agent for a while, then consolidated on OpenClaw.
- Tried
minio /
minio
Object storage for years. Swapped for Garage once the community edition stopped shipping.
- Tried
containrrr /
watchtower
Auto-updates. Archived upstream, and I would rather choose when things update.
- Tried
topoteretes /
cognee
Knowledge-graph memory for agents. A plain markdown brain in git won.
Want to see what I built on top of them?
My own repos live on GitHub. The write-ups live here.
List reviewed September 2026. Stars and licenses change; the "why" is what I care about.