You want to use flexible ssl/tls for starters, doubtful it will work otherwise. Log in to cloudflare, choose domain, then SSL/TLS and see if encryption is set to flexible. See what that gets you, though it can take 15 mins for effects to show up. As long as the server can be reached cloudflare will try and match a certificate so lemmy gets served, as long as the server is set up correctly and the ports etc. are correctly forwarded and open

again - no bias but that seems tiny compared to other “things”

How are you using Cloudflare, and what are you serving the lemmy instance on? I’m guessing it is due to the ssl mode chosen as said before

Pico is kinda like Bludit, but Bludit has plugins. We all know the pros and cons of those but it does save you time if a plugin exists to do something you need, plus it has theme support. So pretty much the same then… I just have used Bludit thus the recommendation

Aye it is… but 400 users seems really small compared to others

I have enjoyed this discussion but some of my UK peers have added that the fediverse in general (like most social media to be fair) when it is new seems to “american” for them. Bluesky suffers from this criticism as well. This puts a lot of UK users off. Heck even threads is described by many as too us focused right now (see the I’m in the UK is anybody else posts on threads)

oh and “installation” is just copy the files to where you want a half decent webserver to serve from. Half decent I mean it is much easier with say apache or nginx but possible with others. Had good results with nginx on a pi4b and Bludit for example

Bludit can do this if you want to save a bit of time… depends on what you want really

Now I know I’m going to say a dirty word here, but I still use cloudflare tunnels. No port forwarding required, yunohost plays nicely as long as you use https forwarding and make sure the tls settings allow any certs to be used. Other ways none cloudflare are around as well if needed… this lemmy instance is hosted at home, using yunohost and cloudflare tunnels

https://lemmy.relayeasy.com/

If the domain is ok yunohost side, and you have the dns side setup and still nothing then the port is not being correctly forwarded to the tinternet.

Tis brand new community (yes really)

thanks… learning as we go here. Run other instances for people but I have got to say for many of my clients they are seeing a massive drop in the fediverse in general after modest growth. The general consensus is that creators want to earn money rather than have freedom

Hey yes, early days with this instance. But seemed the right/correct place to ask generally…

hottest day in what seemed like forever was here on Monday. Stayed away from studio/office as the heat was just unbearable! Im in the UK and it was around 32 outside and 35 in office as the 4-node heat generator was making a racket!

I run bespoke hosting and services and people are spending less and less each month. Been doing it for 30 years in various ways and forms and 2025 is by far the hardest year to get anyone to part with money. Everybody thinks they should setup something ad laden it to death, make a fortune and retire at 30. Here in the UK you should visit a loc(ish) new website and see the content disappear behind a torrent of ads, clickbait articles, AI videos etc.

most say where they are in their bio, easy to track most of em. Plus it is fairly easy to see a UK based person in their language and things they say

I left substack - terrible platform that just seems unnecessary

UK and EU are way ahead the US (for example) on online safety - Meta is despised over here by government and they owe billions in fines they just tie it all up in legal complaints that last years

But pretty much everything else is growing… I am generalising but surely by now there should be way more than 1.1 million. This is what I mean, I see less now than I have before over the Fediverse not more (content, people,reactions)

transitioning away from raid but I do love zfs for flexibility. A lot of the data I have is important for someone or somebody, so zfs and a decent backup solution is in use just to make sure. I went bananas and picked up a used Supermicro 4-node server that takes dual E5 Zeons (V1 or V2) with 2xE5-2620s and 49 gig ram in each node for £80 (I’m in the UK). Plenty of power and next is to upgrade the cpus to slightly better cpus to reduce power as it currently uses 2 nodes and I am pulling around 300 watts most of the time. Backup solution is an old Ryzen 3200G with 32 gig ram that runs truenas and has 5x3tb spinny drives in it