Self-hosting is the activity of having and managing your own server, usually at home, to host your personal data and services yourself, rather than relying solely on third parties. It's like owning a home instead of renting one, giving you more freedom and control over your intellectual property. In web applications and cloud services, self-hosting refers to software installed and maintained by the user on a generic web hosting service, such as a VPS. The advantages of self-hosting are that the user has total control over their data, with a potentially lower monthly cost.
However, it requires your own IT equipment, can result in capital and maintenance expenses, and you may be paying for more capacity than you actually use. Security is not about costs and you must invest in the self-hosted solution to ensure data control and compliance. When hosted automatically, you must develop a data backup and recovery plan to ensure that you are not susceptible to data loss in the event of a disaster situation. Self-hosted VPN services can provide a degree of privacy by hiding web traffic from your ISP and can be used to bypass geographical restrictions on network traffic.
Some software vendors offer the option to choose between a self-hosted (local) version and a cloud version. The local business edition offers you professional support and additional premium and security features for your self-hosted OpenProject. Self-hosting isn't about making the Internet more secure and doesn't provide anonymity on its own. Just like renting and buying, both have advantages and disadvantages. If you want more freedom and control over your intellectual property, you need a self-hosted site.
While YunoHost aims to do all the hard work for you, self-hosting still requires you to take time to learn and configure a few things to set up your server properly.
