Jaypg

You could mount the network share on the host/Ubuntu and then reference it in your docker compose file. It works. I prefer to write the mount in the Docker compose file since it’s a bit more portable. Something like this depending on if you’re using SMB/CIFS or NFS:

services:
    some_music_app:
        image: music_app_image:latest
    container_name: music_app
    volumes:
      - smb:/some/path/smb/music
      - nfs:/some/path/nfs/music
volumes:
  smb:
    driver_opts:
      type: cifs
      o: "username=${user},password=${pass},uid=1000,gid=1000,vers=3.0"
      device: "//tiger-nas/music/music"
  nfs:
    driver: local
    driver_opts:
      type: nfs
      o: addr=tiger-nas,nolock,soft,rw,nfsvers=4
      device: ":path/to/music/music"

The ${user} and ${pass} in the smb volume definition are variables that you’ll need to have in a .env file next to your compose.yaml file. The .env file is just a normal text file with each line setting a value to a variable. Like:

user=my_username  
pass=123_abc_!@#

Then you restrict the permissions of your .env file and you can essentially take a backup of both files and use them on any server with Docker.

It’s not my default shell on most of my servers but I use it all the time. I’m just not a fan of treating everything as a stream of text to grep, trim and sort into structured data that’s easier to work with. Plus, cross platform. I’ve tried nushell a bit but I always go back to PowerShell.

The question is how motivated are you to learn what you need to manage a device?

If you want to dive in and get your hands dirty then I’d recommend a little mini PC off Amazon and Fedora Server which comes out of the box with Cockpit which will help you administer your server. If it’s something you’re not that into and just need storage for your stuff, I’d say pick up a NAS from someone like Synology or Ugreen. They’ll generally take care of themselves.

How much data do you plan on storing? If you’re going to stay under a couple terabytes then you could get away with one of the Bmax or GMKtek mini PCs for under a couple hundred bucks. They’re silent, decent amount of RAM, often have a slot for a second SSD and they’re tiny enough to throw anywhere.

I myself have one being delivered today, but on Amazon there’s a GMKtek mini PC with an Intel N150, 16GB RAM and 1TB SSD on sale for $195. Plex and Jellyfin support the Intel Quicksync engine for transcoding and you can fit several containers/apps in 16GB

If you grow out if it down the road then you’ll have a good idea by then what hardware you need to upgrade to.