Rebuilding the homelab.

So now that we're settled again,things at work and here at home have quieted down a bit I've decided to begin rebuilding my homelab/stack.. this time using more Docker.

I was able to upgrade one of the kids rigs for X-mas so I have the old box, an HP Z400 workstation. It's got an older Xeon and I scrounged up 32 gigs of DDR3 and mirrored a pair of 500gb Sata WB Blues. 
Installed Vsphere 6.5 last weekend and this weekend I'll be setting up the docker host and possibly a few of the first containers.

So the plan for far is the following:

Portainer (because duh)
librenms
Ubuntu (or something with bash to upload images to Wunderground)
Plex (if I can find a suitable replacement for my dead NAS)
Guacamole


Provided I can replace the NAS I'll roll couchpotato and radarr, also thinking about a web server to provide remote access to my networked camera.. still unsure on that one.

All of this being built on top of Vsphere 6.5 because it's the best hypervisor out there. (KVM/QEMU still get some love tho)

Docker, giving it a shot.

So years ago when the name Docker started circulating I thought it was stupid... such BS.
Did I give it 2 minutes?  Nope.  A real head in sand moment if I must say.  FF to today.. I am accessing a full Team license to Pluralsight via $boss at $work and I stumble across the Docker course.
Ok.. fine.
So I plow through the intro and my ears are perked. If I were a dog, my tail would be at 12 o'clock.

So I have this Mac Mini at home that un recently was my Plex media server, well the thunderbolt nas I used as my BE storage up and died. So I loaded docker-ce and went to town.

Right now I've got containers for Pi-hole and Portainer.  I've always wondered how much of an impact pi-hole would make in a house with 5 internet users so it's up and going.  Then portainer because it was recommended by an acquaintance in IRC and a mention from the Googs.

So far pi-hole is eating an impressive 44mb of ram and portainer 7.54mb.  <Borat "very niice">  I'm impressed, honestly. I'm now searching for other legit container uses here at home.. I want more.