This seems like a good place to ask: What is the current state of the art for connecting back to my home network while remote? I want:

access to my home server

ability to stream US TV when abroad (by exiting from my home network)

ability to make it easy for others with non-tech backgrounds to connect with their devices (parents, kids, etc)

ability to have remote linux servers connect automatically on boot. This one is because I can't get OTA TV at home and want to set up a simple streaming box at someone else's house to do it that connects back to my house, so we can stream off all of our devices.

I'm guessing tailscale will be a part of this setup which is why I ask here.

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paxys 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Tailscale will enable all of this.

Set up a US device as an exit node, and configure other devices to proxy through it.

	▲	jd3 25 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		> ability to stream US TV when abroad (by exiting from my home network) Should note that Tailscale does not work natively with hdhr for mpeg television streams b/c wireguard doesn't natively support udp multicast/broadcast. Also can't directly port forward b/c hdhr sets a default ttl of 2. My understanding is that most VPNs in general don't support udp multicast due to operating on the network layer rather than data link, though iirc OpenVPN supports multicast traffic through its virtual TAP (Layer 2) rather than TUN (Layer 3). Tailscale does create a TUN/TAP virtual network[0], though udp multicast is still not natively supported. [0]: https://tailscale.com/docs/concepts/tailscale-osi#data-link-... https://github.com/tailscale/tailscale/issues/1013 https://github.com/tailscale/tailscale/issues/11134

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pants2 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Yes, you've described Tailscale + Exit Nodes + Tailnet that you invite your family to. Install Tailscale and enable some devices as exit nodes - it's pretty much as simple as that.

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nightski 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I just use WireGuard to connect my local network. I see no point in throwing a middleman into the mix.

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Diti 3 hours ago | parent [-]

This comment might be of interest to help you understand what Tailscale does that WireGuard cannot: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47064875

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denkmoon 2 hours ago | parent [-]

I would phrase that as what Tailscale does that is more convenient than wg. If you “barely know what a subnet is” go for it. wg is easy as pie though, and just don’t maintain 90 tunnels… You don’t need a full mesh. An extra hop or two, especially within a lan, won’t hurt.

	▲	mi_lk 32 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		I would recommend WireGuard as well, I primarily use it with Tailscale as backup. WG is straightforward to set up, and with LLM the knowledge gap is now nothing if you have trouble with it

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lemming an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Related question: how are people handling adding family members of varying technical abilities to your tailnets? Does each family member get a separate user so you can manage their access? For my immediate family I was just logging tailscale in as me on their devices, but that becomes a pain when they get logged out and need me to log in again before things go back to working.

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Lammy 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Tailscale is probably what you want, but if you care about privacy you'll have to be sure to disable the telemetry/logging/spying option on each of your nodes.

By default it will leak your so-called “private” network behavior to Tailscale (connections on what port, from what node, to what node, opened when, closed when): https://tailscale.com/docs/features/logging

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fastingrat 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

if you are behind cgnat (both ipv4, ipv6) then vps, have public ipv6 then you can connect via public domain (ddns openwrt) and if you have a public ip, wireguard it is

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colechristensen 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I found good success with OpenWRT/Tomato and WireGuard.

The interface is bad when it comes to provisioning but it can be done with a QR code and once it works the native experience of turning on the VPN was just stunningly fast. In this day and age you expect things to be slow with negotiation and various unreliable steps but it was just amazing that I tap the VPN button on iOS and it's connected in a fraction of a second.