Selfhosted

I use readable names.

I'm using one system for testing purposes, so it's called testingPC.

Any containers are named for the container purposes, like my pihole is named pihole.

My system is so boring that any person were to pick it up after I got hit by a bus would be able to figure out everything.

I have three Proxmox nodes named: acid1, freebones, and a partially decommissioned node aptly named pve

acid1 was named from a sticker I got in a big collection. I was extra sold on the name when I did some research into acid1 tests.

freebones is from an inside joke from a GPT3.5 bot I terribly finetuned using my friend groups entire chat history. At one point the bot randomly said “algebra: you get free bones” and I kind of just ran with that

All my personal devices are named "AHE"+n. So the abbreviation for "at heart engineer"+ a letter signifying the device. So my phone is "AHEM", my laptop is "AHEL", my desktop is "aheo" (O for office), my server is "ahes".

My only currently active machine is a laptop named buttwarmer as per my cat's suggestion.

All my hostnames are after Zen Buddhist concepts, like shikaku, hongaku, mushin, wuwei, jiyu, etc. My printer is the only thing that breaks this trend, it is named pos

I tend to use food names, like tomato and sausage. But no potato, and definitely no apple.

I also utilize the special-use domain home.arpa for all my LAN systems, so accidental collisions are largely impossible.

I name mine after space! Earth, Moon, Mars, Saturn, etc...

I went with Willow related naming.

My main server and NAS is Madmartigan. Proxmox server is Willow. Headless gaming machine is Sorsha. Bedroom/office laptop is Elora Danan Living room laptop is High Aldwin Then two raspberry Pi's named Rool and Franjean.

I'm not even into Willow that much, I just wanted to find a world of characters I liked.

• Knowledge - Desktop
• Enlighten - Laptop
• Insanity - Server
• Madness - Router

Backup: VEEAM01
DC: DC1
VM for taxes and other stuff I don't want on my main pc: ZAHLNIX01 (tl: not paying anything)
NAS01: My NAS file share VM
TEST01: Testing VM
Appoxo-PC2: My main PC (as it's mark 2)
Proxmox host: PVE2 (I planned a cluster but have no other nuc to use in the cluster)
NAS: Current jellyfin and main docker host
PiNAS02: My Raspberry Pi 4

As you see: Very creative.

I'm a fan of Composers. Current and past servers

• Bach
  • B.W.V. 565
  • B.W.V. 1067
  • B.W.V. 906
• Mozart
• Williams
• Goldsmith
• Zimmer
• Arnold
• Poledouris

New ones will be

• Giacchino
• Melumad

Services are just what they are.

• git
• Nextcloud
• APC
• etc

I have been using Uranus moons for all my devices.

I name them after a female important character in whatever novel I'm enjoying when I set the system up. Back when I was single the female was important, now it is just tradition.

Since I like fantasy there are plenty of names available that are both pronounceable and nonsense.

Too many hosts.
Current scheme: British towns names. They are quite unique.

Named mine after "objects" from Iain M. Banks' Culture Novels.

Currently I have:

• gsv
• hub
• excession
• drone

Nice and short, and map roughly to the "power level" of the hardware, so to speak.

And my Yubikeys are named after Special Circumstances agents 😄

Charybdis, hippo, appa, Momo, pabu

At home, colors Whatever color the purpose is.

I use the names of greek deities for my host names, mostly geared towards the function of the server/computer.

• Nyx (dark-blue laptop)
• Hypnos (gaming machine)
• Argus (pi-hole and reverse proxy)
• Prometheus (minecraft server)

I set up my current desktop while reading Gaiman's The Sandman, so it's called Morpheus. Because I felt I needed to keep with the theme, my laptop is hades, my phone persephone, my server apollo, my router helios, the media centre PC is orpheus, the pi that boots and updates it outside of usage hours is eurydice, and the pi that runs home assistant is zeus (because it's responsible for light(n)ing.

Oh, and the work profile on my phone is sisyphos.

So many answers!!

First it was from planets from Ursula Le Guin's Hainish cycle.

Now it's the names of birds visiting my feeder: chickadee, titmouse, mockingbird, etc.

I use concepts of games I like. Right now Alan Wake and Pacific Drive are the two of them.

• Main Laptop: Typewriter
• Steam deck: Poet
• NAS: The Lake
• Main Pc, that has become more a render station since I mostly work on a laptop and game on a steam deck: Lighthouse
• Hue Hub: Light switch
• Phone: Flashlight

But when I started to be more interested in networking and installed openwrt on my router, I was more infatuated by Pacific Drive:

• Router: Outer Containment Wall
• WiFi 5/2.4 Dual: ARDAnet
• WiFi for iot: RemnantNet
• GuestNet: OEZone
• VPN: BreacherNet
• Switch: SparkTower

I go for the unoriginal but oh so simple: location-type-No

So HL-SRV-01 is "homelab server no 1"

HS-DSK-02 is "House desktop no2"

NA-LPT-01 is "Not Applicable" because this is my admin laptop that I expect to move around a lot so I always treat it as high-risk.

I use League of Legends regions. Except for one of them which is not a region but is called "lantern" after the Thresh's lantern in which souls are trapped.

Man I’m lame.

Used to be {env}-function##

Now it’s {env}-{vlanlocation}-function##

VLAN location such as DMZ, Infra, Jump for jump boxes, IOTSec or IOTInsec, Etc

I use the most boring names: LASTNAME-LAPTOP LASTNAME-PHONE LASTNAME-SERVER LASTNAME-ROUTER

But, living in tight suburban spaces, I'm never confused whether a device is mine or somebody else's.

I mostly use battlestar galactica ship names for my own hardware, but it's been mixed with boring '.mydomain.foo' names as well. I should rename a bunch of stuff around and include them in my DNS.

I use some generic names.

• Phone: phone
• Current Laptop: fedora
• Old laptop: laptop
• Router: openwrt

Places in video games is one option for me especially in cluster setups. EG cluster Tamriel has nodes Morrowind, Skyrim, Oblivion, etc.

I tend to use the names of angels for my personal devices (which surprisingly was inspired by this and not NGE)

For laptops I tend to use demons instead, just seems to fit better (which actually was inspired by Gundam IBO but this is the list)

For example:

• desktop (Linux side) is Raziel
• desktop (windows side 😩) is Azrael
• main laptop is Gusion
• eBay Thinkpad is Barbatos

I think a similar post came few time ago, but no ashamed in my case. I use late pet names, for me as a tribute to their memory. Also, I try to put some logic in the name, like the squirrel name for a lightweight VM with not much services / workload or dog name for the reverse proxy (guardian function).

Man I do variations of food truck that don’t exist. Example. Gaming pc : food station Phone:food truck Laptop: foodpad Server:foodcentre

Asterix & Obelix themed.

• Asterix is a rpi4, strong and small with ssd running dockers with homeassistant, revproxy and webserver, and camera storage.
• Idefix is a rpi3, mainly test only nowadays.
• Obelix is my desktop running voidlinux.

I used to have Pneumatix which is the mailman as the mail server and Panoramix, the druid, as domoticz server, Heroix, chief, as firewall and Bellefleur, beauty, as webserver 😉 All were LXD virtual servers on a pentium 3. I try to find a character matching the functionality. Except for domoticz all are now dockers on Asterix, so less use of funny names.

Non linux machines would be roman names from Asterix & Obelix, but I have none ..

At work we used famous dogs. Laika, Pluto, Cerberus etc

Colour + noun:

• redbug
• bluecar
• yellowboat

Depends on how many hostnames I need. If I just need 2, using opposite duals is fun, {romeo,ruliet}.shakespeare.com. 4 I almost always use cardinal directions or the seasons; {north,south,east,west}.domain.com or {spring,summer,fall,winter}.domain.com.

If I need a lot of potential subdomains, you can't beat the Greek or NATO alphabet, giving you 24 and 26 hostnames respectively which can be further enhanced by using the purpose of the server with the alphabet;

• beta-w02.domain.com # second webserver on beta
• beta-db02.domain.com # second db on beta

All of my infrastructure is named after terminator.

• Rlyeh -host/nas
• Cthulhu
• Yog
• Yibb
• Hastur
• Hotep
• Cylitha

Usually, some type of pun based on the hardware.

Rock types and Greek gods. Everything from emerald to Aphrodite.

im very lazy now but i used to use tyrande, shandris, and then rotate around any other kalimidor/kaldorei places and people because when i played warcraft i was obsessed with night elves

I named mine after different Half Life characters: GMAN- Server FREEMAN- Main Gaming Rig ALYX- Laptop

And so on...

Mine are all named for the colour of the case, or case accent when ambiguous, though network infrastructure items are named for their models, being the typical default.

I sometimes use A records or mDNS-SD for the actual services provided and use a *.home.arpa. domain.

Another theme at another site is native fauna and flora names.

No cringe, no pop culture.

I use "butler" terms, like:

• Jarvis
• Archibald - used for my old Arch desktop
• Alfred

They serve me well, and I give them due respect.