What is this series?

I’m an independent developer, and I’ve learned countless lessons about servers the hard way over the past few years.

This series is my collection of 60 practical guides based on real experience, designed to help you:

  • 📦 Save time: No need to figure it out yourself - just copy my configs

  • 💰 Save money: Avoid the pits I fell into

  • 🚀 Copy-paste ready: Every guide has complete commands and configs

Who is this for?

✅ Indie developers who want to deploy beyond Vercel

✅ Developers with coding experience but new to server ops

✅ Anyone who bought a VPS but doesn’t know how to use it well

Roadmap

The series is divided into 7 stages, each solving a category of problems:

🛒 Stage 1: VPS Selection (6 articles)

Not all VPS are right for you. Choose wrong, waste money.

| # | Article | Status |

|—|---------|--------|

| 1 | My Honest Review of 8 VPS Providers | ✅ |

| 2 | 2026 VPS Benchmark Scripts Collection | ✅ |

| 3 | Common VPS Buying Pitfalls to Avoid | ✅ |

| 4 | VPS Routes: CN2/9929/BGP Complete Guide | ✅ |

| 5 | VPS Basics: Why Indie Developers Need a VPS | ✅ |

| 6 | My VPS Selection Checklist | 📝 |

🔐 Stage 2: VPS Initialization & Security (6 articles)

First thing after getting a bare server: lock the door.

| # | Article | Status |

|—|---------|--------|

| 7 | First Hour with VPS: Complete Initialization Guide | ✅ |

| 8 | SSH Key Login Quick Reference | 📝 |

| 9 | SSH Config Management: Managing Multiple Servers | 📝 |

| 10 | BBR Acceleration One-Command Enable | 📝 |

| 11 | UFW Firewall Quick Setup | 📝 |

| 12 | How to Tell if Server is Blocked: IP Detection Tools | 📝 |

🔌 Stage 3: Terminal & Connection Tools (9 articles)

Sharp tools make good work.

| # | Article | Status |

|—|---------|------|

| 13 | SSH Client Showdown: Termius vs Warp vs iTerm2 | 📝 |

| 14 | Termius Pro Tips | 📝 |

| 15 | SSH Connection Management Best Practices | 📝 |

| 16 | Tailscale 5-Min Setup: Easiest VPN | 📝 |

| 17 | Netbird 5-Min Setup: Self-Hostable VPN | 📝 |

| 18 | Zerotier 5-Min Setup: Classic VPN Tool | 📝 |

| 19 | Three VPN Tools Comparison | 📝 |

| 20 | Cloudflare Tunnel Quick Setup | 📝 |

| 21 | My Redundancy Strategy: Multi-Path Backup | 📝 |

🌐 Stage 4: Reverse Proxy & Acceleration (9 articles)

Make your services accessible and fast.

| # | Article | Status |

|—|---------|------|

| 22 | Nginx Proxy Manager Quick Setup | 📝 |

| 23 | Caddy 10-Min Setup | 📝 |

| 24 | Caddy vs Nginx Proxy Manager: Why I Use Both | 📝 |

| 25 | Nginx Config Quick Reference: Common Templates | 📝 |

| 26 | Let’s Encrypt Auto-Renewal Setup | 📝 |

| 27 | Domain Buying Pitfalls to Avoid | 📝 |

| 28 | Cloudflare Free Features Cheatsheet | 📝 |

| 29 | Cloudflare Acceleration实战 | 📝 |

| 30 | DDNS Setup Quick Reference | 📝 |

🐳 Stage 5: Docker Deployment (12 articles)

Everything can be containerized.

| # | Article | Status |

|—|---------|------|

| 31 | Docker One-Command Install Script: All Systems | 📝 |

| 32 | Docker Basic Commands: 20 Commands You Actually Need | 📝 |

| 33 | Docker Compose Intro: From Single to Multi-Container | 📝 |

| 34 | Portainer 10-Min Setup | 📝 |

| 35 | Dockge 10-Min Setup | 📝 |

| 36 | Dokploy 10-Min Setup: PaaS for Indie Devs | 📝 |

| 37 | Three Docker Management Tools Comparison | 📝 |

| 38 | Dokploy Complete Guide | 📝 |

| 39 | Docker Compose Template Library (Part 1) | 📝 |

| 40 | Docker Compose Template Library (Part 2) | 📝 |

| 41 | Docker Network Config Quick Reference | 📝 |

| 42 | Docker Volume Backup & Migration实战 | 📝 |

📊 Stage 6: Monitoring & Ops (9 articles)

Find problems before they find you.

| # | Article | Status |

|—|---------|------|

| 43 | Bezel Monitoring Quick Setup | 📝 |

| 44 | UptimeKuma One-Command Deploy | 📝 |

| 45 | Server Alert Notification Setup | 📝 |

| 46 | My Monitoring Tool Stack | 📝 |

| 47 | Server Log Management & Analysis Intro | 📝 |

| 48 | Automation Scripts Collection | 📝 |

| 49 | Server Security Hardening Checklist | 📝 |

| 50 | Cron Job Quick Reference | 📝 |

| 51 | Common Server Troubleshooting Guide | 📝 |

💻 Stage 7: Development Environment Setup (9 articles)

Remote development, anywhere anytime.

| # | Article | Status |

|—|---------|------|

| 52 | VS Code Remote SSH Setup | 📝 |

| 53 | VS Code Tunnel: Code in Browser | 📝 |

| 54 | Dev Container vs Local Environment | 📝 |

| 55 | Multi-User Isolated Dev Environment | 📝 |

| 56 | Managing 50 Projects on One VPS: Port Planning | 📝 |

| 57 | Self-Host Git Server: Gitea One-Command Deploy | 📝 |

| 58 | PostgreSQL/MySQL/Redis Docker Deploy Quick Ref | 📝 |

| 59 | My Complete Dev-Ops Workflow | 📝 |

| 60 | Indie Developer Tool List: 2026 Edition | 📝 |

Current Progress

1
2
3
4
5

Completed: 7/60 articles

Expected completion: May 2026

Reading Order

Beginners: Start from #1, read in order

Already have VPS: Jump to #7 (Initialization), then pick what you need

Just want Docker: Articles #31-42

Stay Updated

New articles 2-3 times per week:

  • ⭐ Bookmark this page to check progress

  • 🐦 Follow me on Twitter for updates

  • 📧 RSS Subscribe: /atom.xml

Questions?

This series will be continuously updated, aiming to be a one-stop reference for indie developer server operations.