I have an old inventory list on an Excel spreadsheet. Haven’t bothered to manage forever, so I decided to start over. I’m mostly concerned having a reliable/accessible way for family to ascertain value of that inventory should I pass unexpectedly.
I prefer network storage over a local machine, and didn’t want it in a cloud I didn’t own the physical hardware.
At minimum, they just need to know how to access the VM from a local OS, or connect to it using the VM manager on the Synology NAS GUI, both of which are straightforward for them.
After trying a handful of open source solutions to store inventory on a local Network Attached Storage, I found a way for JE to work for me.
Currently running a Synology DS930+ with 8GB of RAM. I have Docker running a container for Calibre (eBooks). I attempted work my way through the Docker documentation to get JE to run in a Java container, then link it to the derby database in a separate container, but that setup requires knowledge I don’t have right now to assess if that’s possible.
But, this approach appears promising so far:
- Running a LinuxLite OS using the Synology VM manager, dedicated to JE.
- Made a script to auto run JE at boot.
- Made the VM accessible via VNC.
- VM has access to shared folders in the NAS
The VM is accessible on macOS, Windows using TightVNC, and Linux via VNC. Local screen sharing - horay.
Synology has an iOS app, DS Photo, that may work really well with this set up.
- I can photograph my inventory.
- Uploaded specific photos to a shared folder on the NAS using DS Photo.
- Access the shared folder on the VM to copy the photos to the VM, so I can link it to the db in JE.
I‘m going to fill in some inventory and run a report to see how it all works out.
Eventually, I’d like to keep an encrypted/password protected static copy of that report on OneNote, or something like that.
Just sharing my enjoyment from the process until I can play with the new CP version.
My plan for the upgrade is export data (in the form of a spreadsheet) from JE and import to CP. If need be, I can write a separate database program that reads from one and writes to the other.