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★ NARCPLEX ; 🦇
☆ … NARC / NPD + PLEX ?!
A plurplex (link) term that means the system’s narcissistic personality disorder affects the entire system. It doesn’t have to affect everyone the same, it just has to affect everyone. A narcplex system may have headmates that fill different narcissistic stereotypes (the arrogant, the grandiose, the secretary, etc.), headmates with differing amounts of empathy, some headmates that are generally more open to criticism than others or any other kind of arrangement. A narcplex system may also just be narcplex by default of having the disorder without it majorly affecting anyone.
©️ CREDIT @npdflag (flags) @isobug (icon) 🗯️ TAGGING @plurplex-archive-dot-net @plurchive ⚠️ WARNING while our terms have no DNI and anyone can use them, this is still to an extent our personal blog. you are free to do and use this term however you want: like it, reblog it, kiss it. however other parts of our blog do not follow this rule and we are block-happy.
#narcplex#-plex#plex#plex terms#system terms#plural terms#npd#actually npd#actually narcissistic#mogai coining#mogai term#liom term#liom#liom coining#mogai#plural coining#npdplex#scribbling on loose post it notes — @#the 2020 alt scene emo decorated coffin ⨾ 🦇
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bunch of losers
#rubulart#loser plex worker au#fnaf#fnaf sb#fnaf sun#fnaf moon#monty gator#montgomery gatoy#roxanne wolf#glamrock chica#fnaf dca#daycare attendent#plex workers job is to nap on the clock and montys job is to keep them alive which is a constant struggle
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On the other end
A small dcaXy/n idea I had
Premis: Y/N works part time in the daycare but doesn't really interact with the dca which doesn't mean the dca didn't notice them there.
Start of the story
Y/N gets messages from an unknown number and decides to answer
They start messaging thinking that they don't know each other at all
They notice that the tone and wording in the messages switches completely throughout the day but get used to it way too fast
Y/N's life is a complete mess right now so Unknown is a pleasant distraction
They never tell each other their real names but use nicknames instead
Both share how they feel often and text about life and just anything that they think of
Someday y/n just calls their unknown friend to share some great news because they have no one else they want to share it with
They don't pick up but call back later
A male voice they have never heard answers. A pleasant one. They talk for hours.
But the voice tells them to only call at night bc he can't talk on the phone while working. But texting is fine
Y/N falls in love over late night phone calls and long text convos
They ask if they could meet up and hang out
He doesn't answer
The connection goes silent
The last thing he sent is "I'm so sorry. But I can't" written only a few minutes after their question (in the middle of the day)
Hours go by and they get no answer from him anymore
Hurt and worried Y/N is in a daze of crying and starring at nothing for the rest of the week
This is when Y/N misses their break bc they stayed in the daycare closet to cry
As they step out the daycare is dark sth that Y/N was never there to see
Then they hear it. The voice of the person they love singing from where the kids are sleeping.
Y/N stumbles through the dark until they reach the kids and lock eyes with the daycare attendant
Moon goes quiet and his eyes betray him and show his shock
Y/N is stunned
"It's you?"
Awkward
P2, P3
#fnaf dca#fnaf moon#fnaf sun#dca au#dca sun#dca moon#dca x reader#dca x y/n#fnaf daycare attendant#fnaf dca au#my art#It would probably be fun to switch perspectives between the dca and yn and make the reader an accomplice in the catfishing >:3#There is still the problem of world building but one could just use the pizza plex as the hub for all of yn's problems#I just think seeing sun and moon brainstorm what to answer to yn's messages hilarious#sun losing it and writing near paragraphs of text and moon only using emotes or short form answers#but then turns around and asks the most personal and thought provoking questions ever#And sun having a panic attack when the call happens standing like an idiot in the middle of the daycare#contemplating if he should just pick and run to their room
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shrödinger's plex fic (they are real to me)
EBY eclipse and y/n ref here!! :3
#pingdoobles#dca fandom#fnaf daycare attendant#fnaf dca#sundrop#dca au#moondrop#fnaf sun#fnaf moon#FINALLY got around to making a more detailed ref of the boys for a plex fic ive been conjuring in the background#i have nothing to really share other than that it's just a very self-indulgent plex fic and the blorbos get fun designs cause i say so#ive been itching to draw for days now ourgh#anyways eclipse and the y/n design are next once i eat and get iced coffee#eclipsed by you#EBY#daycare attendant x reader#constant battle of “do i write” and “do i draw” help#hypothetically i write fics#cw eyestrain#cw bright colors#eyestrain#bright colors#EBY sun#EBY moon
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on my freak shit (fear/comfort/reassurance)
#fnaf#daycare attendant#sun#moon#eclipse#cole#first pic context: thinkin of runnin thru the woods as these bitches hunt u down for funsies#listen dont look at me im built different#whats a better bonding activity then hunting down ur newly aquired little pet through the cold dark forest at night#or thru the plex basement if ur keepin it security breach style#get them all spooked and upset so u can snugglecuddle them better
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🤖🎶 I am your robot friend, Im here to help you!
You are my robot friend, we play together! 🎶🤖
#my art#plex yo gabba gabba#yo gabba gabba#hatsune miku#coachella went crazy when these two were on the scene
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I absolutely love your updated Daycare attendant, especially Moon such a handsome beast. I've always loved your version of Moon it my favorite one
Thank you so much!!! 🫶 I’m so glad you enjoy their updated looks! (I’ve never been this happy with their designs haha. Especially Moon’s!)
I’m flattered you enjoyed my old Moon too! My old DCA designs are sorta weird to me lol! They were definitely a result of me wanting to have fun with the designs but also being scared to stray too far from canon! (You can def see that in Moon’s colors) Honestly though, my AU isn’t canon! So there’s no reason to be anxious over making them too different! It’s supposed to be a reflection of my current tastes, my Sun and (especially) Moon designs really encapsulate that! :D
Also here! I realize I haven’t really posted ART since January (oops) so I do have a small handful of sketches pertaining to the DCA!

[Moon concept]
Above is one of my first attempts at redesigning my DCA! There was a previous version with full stars that looked more like my old style but I found I didn’t enjoy those at all. A problem I’ve always had with my old Moon’s design would be the star patterns on his pants, hat, and sleeves. They often weren’t very sharp and looked kinda ‘spacey’ (and not in the cool celestial way lol!) They kinda looked more like an overlay and lacked definition, making my old Moon’s design kinda lack luster? So the first thing I wanted to do was figure out that pattern more! (I ended up going with a split look to help make the stars that are there not overwhelm the character)
This fixed up first pass is pretty close to what I ended up going with, though I decided to change some anatomical things to make him look more doll like and more elongated. (I really wanted to make them look uncanny when they don’t have their jester fits! Like they are fully relying on those outfits not to look uncomfortable.)

[Moon and @shadysubject06 ‘s Chica!!]
I briefly mentioned what my DCA’s side facial profile would look like in the ref post, so here’s an actual drawing of it! They do look pretty humanoid in head shape, though with a weak chin and flat nose to accommodate the ‘dinner plate’ look lol. I love how Moon here looks like he’s the MC of an anime that just bumped into the love interest and is all ‘flutters eyelashes’ and starry eyed.
A big change I made between my old and new Moon designs would be the titular nightcap. Before my Moon’s nightcap sat upon his head normally and was SUPER long! Like to the floor. The more I thought about it the more I began to get uncertain about the idea. Like sure, that’s fine if Moon were more like his canon self at around 7ft, but my DCA is 12’8”! As someone who sews, the amount of fabric needed to make a nightcap that both fits Moon but is long enough to drag on the floor gives me a headache. Besides, I found I really loved the ‘covers one eye’ look so much more. He looks shy, like he’s hiding behind his own hat. Also I wanted him to fidget with his hat more, so having it hang over one eye makes it a lot more accessible! (Also I am one of those FNaF fans who tries to think about the base logic on how these characters are built. 💔 i can’t help it.. it makes designing more fun. The only place where a hat like that could be stored would likely be somewhere in the torso, and my old DCA’s torso was pretty packed already. 😭)
[Jack-o’-Moon / Harvest Moon concept]
Also had fun with a Halloween design idea! (I know it’s not even fall….) this drawing is pretty accurate, though the main sun rays would not be present for this design as this is technically Moon.
This costume would be used for the week of Halloween in the plex, the mall working like a fun family friendly fall fest in the day and a horror attraction at night. Sun would refer to himself as ‘Jack-o’-Sun’ as Sun’s specific look would fall into the pumpkin jack-o’-lantern look during the day! At night the staff would make Moon look a bit more scary and we’d get ‘Harvest Moon’, who plays more into the whole grim reaper look. Not sure if they’d actually have a scythe but I thought drawing them with one was fun!
I have a lot more lore to drop but this post is getting way too long and I’ve rambled enough. Thank you for the ask!! I really appreciate it! Nighty Night!
#ask: answered#vanilla au#moon#moondrop#moon fnaf#fnaf moon#daycare attendant#sun#Sundrop#Sun fnaf#fnaf sun#oh btw!#I do have a silly ‘eye chart’ for all the canon characters in the plex#(minus staff bots)#let me know if anyone wants to see that!#I made it REALLY quickly a while back but it shows their eye colors/patterns!
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An “what if there’s a pizzaplex location in China” au


They're an Eclipse, but you can just call them Wu Dan
They are a theater bot from the Shanghai pizzaplex, they play the Wu Dan role (female warrior/fighter role) in Traditional Chinese opera. They can sing they can dance, they perform with a spear, and they do Bian Lian mask trick.
Most time they stay as Eclipse but if needed they can switch between Sun and Moon on command. As the picture shows, the red mask is Sun, the Blue mask is moon, the split face is when both are up but not in sync, they can’t stay like that for long it burns their battery, and the white face is Eclipse
Sun is more hot headed and extroverted, Moon is more ‘hohoho I’m evil’ and introverted, when split face, they’re mostly having a fight and they use their traits against each other, when Eclipse, their traits are combined creating an neutralized version of themselves
#will there be more?#maybe#I adore this idea#but at the same time every time I draw them I hands cry for mercy#I’m not one to draw complicated designs and it shows#my art#oc#dcaverse#I’m not tagging sun moon individually because how far away their design is#if I just say hey new oc and y’all are gonna believe me#Wu Dan#Ah also shout out to gitm and the server#opened me to possibility of plex locations all over the world
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Make this holiday special with Freddy & Friends Valentine's Day cards featuring the Daycare Attendant. Grab them today before they're gone!
#loaf art#fnaf daycare attendant#fnaf sun#sundrop#fnaf moon#moondrop#dca fandom#valentines day#sneaking these in here right before the end of the 14th#I included the cards without the background or paper texture in case folks want to print them out#Is that presumptuous? Yes! Very! But I wanted to offer that up in case it IS wanted#I had plans to do a full set of cards with the glamrocks and other 'plex animatronics but ran out of time#despite that I still had fun designing these cards and making them look like those box sets you can get at the store#special thanks to muffin for helping me troubleshoot the dca's color palette!
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How I ditched streaming services and learned to love Linux: A step-by-step guide to building your very own personal media streaming server (V2.0: REVISED AND EXPANDED EDITION)
This is a revised, corrected and expanded version of my tutorial on setting up a personal media server that previously appeared on my old blog (donjuan-auxenfers). I expect that that post is still making the rounds (hopefully with my addendum on modifying group share permissions in Ubuntu to circumvent 0x8007003B "Unexpected Network Error" messages in Windows 10/11 when transferring files) but I have no way of checking. Anyway this new revised version of the tutorial corrects one or two small errors I discovered when rereading what I wrote, adds links to all products mentioned and is just more polished generally. I also expanded it a bit, pointing more adventurous users toward programs such as Sonarr/Radarr/Lidarr and Overseerr which can be used for automating user requests and media collection.
So then, what is this tutorial? This is a tutorial on how to build and set up your own personal media server using Ubuntu as an operating system and Plex (or Jellyfin) to not only manage your media, but to also stream that media to your devices both at home and abroad anywhere in the world where you have an internet connection. Its intent is to show you how building a personal media server and stuffing it full of films, TV, and music that you acquired through indiscriminate and voracious media piracy various legal methods will free you to completely ditch paid streaming services. No more will you have to pay for Disney+, Netflix, HBOMAX, Hulu, Amazon Prime, Peacock, CBS All Access, Paramount+, Crave or any other streaming service that is not named Criterion Channel. Instead whenever you want to watch your favourite films and television shows, you’ll have your own personal service that only features things that you want to see, with files that you have control over. And for music fans out there, both Jellyfin and Plex support music streaming, meaning you can even ditch music streaming services. Goodbye Spotify, Youtube Music, Tidal and Apple Music, welcome back unreasonably large MP3 (or FLAC) collections.
On the hardware front, I’m going to offer a few options catered towards different budgets and media library sizes. The cost of getting a media server up and running using this guide will cost you anywhere from $450 CAD/$325 USD at the low end to $1500 CAD/$1100 USD at the high end (it could go higher). My server was priced closer to the higher figure, but I went and got a lot more storage than most people need. If that seems like a little much, consider for a moment, do you have a roommate, a close friend, or a family member who would be willing to chip in a few bucks towards your little project provided they get access? Well that's how I funded my server. It might also be worth thinking about the cost over time, i.e. how much you spend yearly on subscriptions vs. a one time cost of setting up a server. Additionally there's just the joy of being able to scream "fuck you" at all those show cancelling, library deleting, hedge fund vampire CEOs who run the studios through denying them your money. Drive a stake through David Zaslav's heart.
On the software side I will walk you step-by-step through installing Ubuntu as your server's operating system, configuring your storage as a RAIDz array with ZFS, sharing your zpool to Windows with Samba, running a remote connection between your server and your Windows PC, and then a little about started with Plex/Jellyfin. Every terminal command you will need to input will be provided, and I even share a custom #bash script that will make used vs. available drive space on your server display correctly in Windows.
If you have a different preferred flavour of Linux (Arch, Manjaro, Redhat, Fedora, Mint, OpenSUSE, CentOS, Slackware etc. et. al.) and are aching to tell me off for being basic and using Ubuntu, this tutorial is not for you. The sort of person with a preferred Linux distro is the sort of person who can do this sort of thing in their sleep. Also I don't care. This tutorial is intended for the average home computer user. This is also why we’re not using a more exotic home server solution like running everything through Docker Containers and managing it through a dashboard like Homarr or Heimdall. While such solutions are fantastic and can be very easy to maintain once you have it all set up, wrapping your brain around Docker is a whole thing in and of itself. If you do follow this tutorial and had fun putting everything together, then I would encourage you to return in a year’s time, do your research and set up everything with Docker Containers.
Lastly, this is a tutorial aimed at Windows users. Although I was a daily user of OS X for many years (roughly 2008-2023) and I've dabbled quite a bit with various Linux distributions (mostly Ubuntu and Manjaro), my primary OS these days is Windows 11. Many things in this tutorial will still be applicable to Mac users, but others (e.g. setting up shares) you will have to look up for yourself. I doubt it would be difficult to do so.
Nothing in this tutorial will require feats of computing expertise. All you will need is a basic computer literacy (i.e. an understanding of what a filesystem and directory are, and a degree of comfort in the settings menu) and a willingness to learn a thing or two. While this guide may look overwhelming at first glance, it is only because I want to be as thorough as possible. I want you to understand exactly what it is you're doing, I don't want you to just blindly follow steps. If you half-way know what you’re doing, you will be much better prepared if you ever need to troubleshoot.
Honestly, once you have all the hardware ready it shouldn't take more than an afternoon or two to get everything up and running.
(This tutorial is just shy of seven thousand words long so the rest is under the cut.)
Step One: Choosing Your Hardware
Linux is a light weight operating system, depending on the distribution there's close to no bloat. There are recent distributions available at this very moment that will run perfectly fine on a fourteen year old i3 with 4GB of RAM. Moreover, running Plex or Jellyfin isn’t resource intensive in 90% of use cases. All this is to say, we don’t require an expensive or powerful computer. This means that there are several options available: 1) use an old computer you already have sitting around but aren't using 2) buy a used workstation from eBay, or what I believe to be the best option, 3) order an N100 Mini-PC from AliExpress or Amazon.
Note: If you already have an old PC sitting around that you’ve decided to use, fantastic, move on to the next step.
When weighing your options, keep a few things in mind: the number of people you expect to be streaming simultaneously at any one time, the resolution and bitrate of your media library (4k video takes a lot more processing power than 1080p) and most importantly, how many of those clients are going to be transcoding at any one time. Transcoding is what happens when the playback device does not natively support direct playback of the source file. This can happen for a number of reasons, such as the playback device's native resolution being lower than the file's internal resolution, or because the source file was encoded in a video codec unsupported by the playback device.
Ideally we want any transcoding to be performed by hardware. This means we should be looking for a computer with an Intel processor with Quick Sync. Quick Sync is a dedicated core on the CPU die designed specifically for video encoding and decoding. This specialized hardware makes for highly efficient transcoding both in terms of processing overhead and power draw. Without these Quick Sync cores, transcoding must be brute forced through software. This takes up much more of a CPU’s processing power and requires much more energy. But not all Quick Sync cores are created equal and you need to keep this in mind if you've decided either to use an old computer or to shop for a used workstation on eBay
Any Intel processor from second generation Core (Sandy Bridge circa 2011) onward has Quick Sync cores. It's not until 6th gen (Skylake), however, that the cores support the H.265 HEVC codec. Intel’s 10th gen (Comet Lake) processors introduce support for 10bit HEVC and HDR tone mapping. And the recent 12th gen (Alder Lake) processors brought with them hardware AV1 decoding. As an example, while an 8th gen (Kaby Lake) i5-8500 will be able to hardware transcode a H.265 encoded file, it will fall back to software transcoding if given a 10bit H.265 file. If you’ve decided to use that old PC or to look on eBay for an old Dell Optiplex keep this in mind.
Note 1: The price of old workstations varies wildly and fluctuates frequently. If you get lucky and go shopping shortly after a workplace has liquidated a large number of their workstations you can find deals for as low as $100 on a barebones system, but generally an i5-8500 workstation with 16gb RAM will cost you somewhere in the area of $260 CAD/$200 USD.
Note 2: The AMD equivalent to Quick Sync is called Video Core Next, and while it's fine, it's not as efficient and not as mature a technology. It was only introduced with the first generation Ryzen CPUs and it only got decent with their newest CPUs, we want something cheap.
Alternatively you could forgo having to keep track of what generation of CPU is equipped with Quick Sync cores that feature support for which codecs, and just buy an N100 mini-PC. For around the same price or less of a used workstation you can pick up a mini-PC with an Intel N100 processor. The N100 is a four-core processor based on the 12th gen Alder Lake architecture and comes equipped with the latest revision of the Quick Sync cores. These little processors offer astounding hardware transcoding capabilities for their size and power draw. Otherwise they perform equivalent to an i5-6500, which isn't a terrible CPU. A friend of mine uses an N100 machine as a dedicated retro emulation gaming system and it does everything up to 6th generation consoles just fine. The N100 is also a remarkably efficient chip, it sips power. In fact, the difference between running one of these and an old workstation could work out to hundreds of dollars a year in energy bills depending on where you live.
You can find these Mini-PCs all over Amazon or for a little cheaper on AliExpress. They range in price from $170 CAD/$125 USD for a no name N100 with 8GB RAM to $280 CAD/$200 USD for a Beelink S12 Pro with 16GB RAM. The brand doesn't really matter, they're all coming from the same three factories in Shenzen, go for whichever one fits your budget or has features you want. 8GB RAM should be enough, Linux is lightweight and Plex only calls for 2GB RAM. 16GB RAM might result in a slightly snappier experience, especially with ZFS. A 256GB SSD is more than enough for what we need as a boot drive, but going for a bigger drive might allow you to get away with things like creating preview thumbnails for Plex, but it’s up to you and your budget.
The Mini-PC I wound up buying was a Firebat AK2 Plus with 8GB RAM and a 256GB SSD. It looks like this:
Note: Be forewarned that if you decide to order a Mini-PC from AliExpress, note the type of power adapter it ships with. The mini-PC I bought came with an EU power adapter and I had to supply my own North American power supply. Thankfully this is a minor issue as barrel plug 30W/12V/2.5A power adapters are easy to find and can be had for $10.
Step Two: Choosing Your Storage
Storage is the most important part of our build. It is also the most expensive. Thankfully it’s also the most easily upgrade-able down the line.
For people with a smaller media collection (4TB to 8TB), a more limited budget, or who will only ever have two simultaneous streams running, I would say that the most economical course of action would be to buy a USB 3.0 8TB external HDD. Something like this one from Western Digital or this one from Seagate. One of these external drives will cost you in the area of $200 CAD/$140 USD. Down the line you could add a second external drive or replace it with a multi-drive RAIDz set up such as detailed below.
If a single external drive the path for you, move on to step three.
For people with larger media libraries (12TB+), who prefer media in 4k, or care who about data redundancy, the answer is a RAID array featuring multiple HDDs in an enclosure.
Note: If you are using an old PC or used workstatiom as your server and have the room for at least three 3.5" drives, and as many open SATA ports on your mother board you won't need an enclosure, just install the drives into the case. If your old computer is a laptop or doesn’t have room for more internal drives, then I would suggest an enclosure.
The minimum number of drives needed to run a RAIDz array is three, and seeing as RAIDz is what we will be using, you should be looking for an enclosure with three to five bays. I think that four disks makes for a good compromise for a home server. Regardless of whether you go for a three, four, or five bay enclosure, do be aware that in a RAIDz array the space equivalent of one of the drives will be dedicated to parity at a ratio expressed by the equation 1 − 1/n i.e. in a four bay enclosure equipped with four 12TB drives, if we configured our drives in a RAIDz1 array we would be left with a total of 36TB of usable space (48TB raw size). The reason for why we might sacrifice storage space in such a manner will be explained in the next section.
A four bay enclosure will cost somewhere in the area of $200 CDN/$140 USD. You don't need anything fancy, we don't need anything with hardware RAID controls (RAIDz is done entirely in software) or even USB-C. An enclosure with USB 3.0 will perform perfectly fine. Don’t worry too much about USB speed bottlenecks. A mechanical HDD will be limited by the speed of its mechanism long before before it will be limited by the speed of a USB connection. I've seen decent looking enclosures from TerraMaster, Yottamaster, Mediasonic and Sabrent.
When it comes to selecting the drives, as of this writing, the best value (dollar per gigabyte) are those in the range of 12TB to 20TB. I settled on 12TB drives myself. If 12TB to 20TB drives are out of your budget, go with what you can afford, or look into refurbished drives. I'm not sold on the idea of refurbished drives but many people swear by them.
When shopping for harddrives, search for drives designed specifically for NAS use. Drives designed for NAS use typically have better vibration dampening and are designed to be active 24/7. They will also often make use of CMR (conventional magnetic recording) as opposed to SMR (shingled magnetic recording). This nets them a sizable read/write performance bump over typical desktop drives. Seagate Ironwolf and Toshiba NAS are both well regarded brands when it comes to NAS drives. I would avoid Western Digital Red drives at this time. WD Reds were a go to recommendation up until earlier this year when it was revealed that they feature firmware that will throw up false SMART warnings telling you to replace the drive at the three year mark quite often when there is nothing at all wrong with that drive. It will likely even be good for another six, seven, or more years.
Step Three: Installing Linux
For this step you will need a USB thumbdrive of at least 6GB in capacity, an .ISO of Ubuntu, and a way to make that thumbdrive bootable media.
First download a copy of Ubuntu desktop (for best performance we could download the Server release, but for new Linux users I would recommend against the server release. The server release is strictly command line interface only, and having a GUI is very helpful for most people. Not many people are wholly comfortable doing everything through the command line, I'm certainly not one of them, and I grew up with DOS 6.0. 22.04.3 Jammy Jellyfish is the current Long Term Service release, this is the one to get.
Download the .ISO and then download and install balenaEtcher on your Windows PC. BalenaEtcher is an easy to use program for creating bootable media, you simply insert your thumbdrive, select the .ISO you just downloaded, and it will create a bootable installation media for you.
Once you've made a bootable media and you've got your Mini-PC (or you old PC/used workstation) in front of you, hook it directly into your router with an ethernet cable, and then plug in the HDD enclosure, a monitor, a mouse and a keyboard. Now turn that sucker on and hit whatever key gets you into the BIOS (typically ESC, DEL or F2). If you’re using a Mini-PC check to make sure that the P1 and P2 power limits are set correctly, my N100's P1 limit was set at 10W, a full 20W under the chip's power limit. Also make sure that the RAM is running at the advertised speed. My Mini-PC’s RAM was set at 2333Mhz out of the box when it should have been 3200Mhz. Once you’ve done that, key over to the boot order and place the USB drive first in the boot order. Then save the BIOS settings and restart.
After you restart you’ll be greeted by Ubuntu's installation screen. Installing Ubuntu is really straight forward, select the "minimal" installation option, as we won't need anything on this computer except for a browser (Ubuntu comes preinstalled with Firefox) and Plex Media Server/Jellyfin Media Server. Also remember to delete and reformat that Windows partition! We don't need it.
Step Four: Installing ZFS and Setting Up the RAIDz Array
Note: If you opted for just a single external HDD skip this step and move onto setting up a Samba share.
Once Ubuntu is installed it's time to configure our storage by installing ZFS to build our RAIDz array. ZFS is a "next-gen" file system that is both massively flexible and massively complex. It's capable of snapshot backup, self healing error correction, ZFS pools can be configured with drives operating in a supplemental manner alongside the storage vdev (e.g. fast cache, dedicated secondary intent log, hot swap spares etc.). It's also a file system very amenable to fine tuning. Block and sector size are adjustable to use case and you're afforded the option of different methods of inline compression. If you'd like a very detailed overview and explanation of its various features and tips on tuning a ZFS array check out these articles from Ars Technica. For now we're going to ignore all these features and keep it simple, we're going to pull our drives together into a single vdev running in RAIDz which will be the entirety of our zpool, no fancy cache drive or SLOG.
Open up the terminal and type the following commands:
sudo apt update
then
sudo apt install zfsutils-linux
This will install the ZFS utility. Verify that it's installed with the following command:
zfs --version
Now, it's time to check that the HDDs we have in the enclosure are healthy, running, and recognized. We also want to find out their device IDs and take note of them:
sudo fdisk -1
Note: You might be wondering why some of these commands require "sudo" in front of them while others don't. "Sudo" is short for "super user do”. When and where "sudo" is used has to do with the way permissions are set up in Linux. Only the "root" user has the access level to perform certain tasks in Linux. As a matter of security and safety regular user accounts are kept separate from the "root" user. It's not advised (or even possible) to boot into Linux as "root" with most modern distributions. Instead by using "sudo" our regular user account is temporarily given the power to do otherwise forbidden things. Don't worry about it too much at this stage, but if you want to know more check out this introduction.
If everything is working you should get a list of the various drives detected along with their device IDs which will look like this: /dev/sdc. You can also check the device IDs of the drives by opening the disk utility app. Jot these IDs down as we'll need them for our next step, creating our RAIDz array.
RAIDz is similar to RAID-5 in that instead of striping your data over multiple disks, exchanging redundancy for speed and available space (RAID-0), or mirroring your data writing by two copies of every piece (RAID-1), it instead writes parity blocks across the disks in addition to striping, this provides a balance of speed, redundancy and available space. If a single drive fails, the parity blocks on the working drives can be used to reconstruct the entire array as soon as a replacement drive is added.
Additionally, RAIDz improves over some of the common RAID-5 flaws. It's more resilient and capable of self healing, as it is capable of automatically checking for errors against a checksum. It's more forgiving in this way, and it's likely that you'll be able to detect when a drive is dying well before it fails. A RAIDz array can survive the loss of any one drive.
Note: While RAIDz is indeed resilient, if a second drive fails during the rebuild, you're fucked. Always keep backups of things you can't afford to lose. This tutorial, however, is not about proper data safety.
To create the pool, use the following command:
sudo zpool create "zpoolnamehere" raidz "device IDs of drives we're putting in the pool"
For example, let's creatively name our zpool "mypool". This poil will consist of four drives which have the device IDs: sdb, sdc, sdd, and sde. The resulting command will look like this:
sudo zpool create mypool raidz /dev/sdb /dev/sdc /dev/sdd /dev/sde
If as an example you bought five HDDs and decided you wanted more redundancy dedicating two drive to this purpose, we would modify the command to "raidz2" and the command would look something like the following:
sudo zpool create mypool raidz2 /dev/sdb /dev/sdc /dev/sdd /dev/sde /dev/sdf
An array configured like this is known as RAIDz2 and is able to survive two disk failures.
Once the zpool has been created, we can check its status with the command:
zpool status
Or more concisely with:
zpool list
The nice thing about ZFS as a file system is that a pool is ready to go immediately after creation. If we were to set up a traditional RAID-5 array using mbam, we'd have to sit through a potentially hours long process of reformatting and partitioning the drives. Instead we're ready to go right out the gates.
The zpool should be automatically mounted to the filesystem after creation, check on that with the following:
df -hT | grep zfs
Note: If your computer ever loses power suddenly, say in event of a power outage, you may have to re-import your pool. In most cases, ZFS will automatically import and mount your pool, but if it doesn’t and you can't see your array, simply open the terminal and type sudo zpool import -a.
By default a zpool is mounted at /"zpoolname". The pool should be under our ownership but let's make sure with the following command:
sudo chown -R "yourlinuxusername" /"zpoolname"
Note: Changing file and folder ownership with "chown" and file and folder permissions with "chmod" are essential commands for much of the admin work in Linux, but we won't be dealing with them extensively in this guide. If you'd like a deeper tutorial and explanation you can check out these two guides: chown and chmod.
You can access the zpool file system through the GUI by opening the file manager (the Ubuntu default file manager is called Nautilus) and clicking on "Other Locations" on the sidebar, then entering the Ubuntu file system and looking for a folder with your pool's name. Bookmark the folder on the sidebar for easy access.
Your storage pool is now ready to go. Assuming that we already have some files on our Windows PC we want to copy to over, we're going to need to install and configure Samba to make the pool accessible in Windows.
Step Five: Setting Up Samba/Sharing
Samba is what's going to let us share the zpool with Windows and allow us to write to it from our Windows machine. First let's install Samba with the following commands:
sudo apt-get update
then
sudo apt-get install samba
Next create a password for Samba.
sudo smbpswd -a "yourlinuxusername"
It will then prompt you to create a password. Just reuse your Ubuntu user password for simplicity's sake.
Note: if you're using just a single external drive replace the zpool location in the following commands with wherever it is your external drive is mounted, for more information see this guide on mounting an external drive in Ubuntu.
After you've created a password we're going to create a shareable folder in our pool with this command
mkdir /"zpoolname"/"foldername"
Now we're going to open the smb.conf file and make that folder shareable. Enter the following command.
sudo nano /etc/samba/smb.conf
This will open the .conf file in nano, the terminal text editor program. Now at the end of smb.conf add the following entry:
["foldername"]
path = /"zpoolname"/"foldername"
available = yes
valid users = "yourlinuxusername"
read only = no
writable = yes
browseable = yes
guest ok = no
Ensure that there are no line breaks between the lines and that there's a space on both sides of the equals sign. Our next step is to allow Samba traffic through the firewall:
sudo ufw allow samba
Finally restart the Samba service:
sudo systemctl restart smbd
At this point we'll be able to access to the pool, browse its contents, and read and write to it from Windows. But there's one more thing left to do, Windows doesn't natively support the ZFS file systems and will read the used/available/total space in the pool incorrectly. Windows will read available space as total drive space, and all used space as null. This leads to Windows only displaying a dwindling amount of "available" space as the drives are filled. We can fix this! Functionally this doesn't actually matter, we can still write and read to and from the disk, it just makes it difficult to tell at a glance the proportion of used/available space, so this is an optional step but one I recommend (this step is also unnecessary if you're just using a single external drive). What we're going to do is write a little shell script in #bash. Open nano with the terminal with the command:
nano
Now insert the following code:
#!/bin/bash CUR_PATH=`pwd` ZFS_CHECK_OUTPUT=$(zfs get type $CUR_PATH 2>&1 > /dev/null) > /dev/null if [[ $ZFS_CHECK_OUTPUT == *not\ a\ ZFS* ]] then IS_ZFS=false else IS_ZFS=true fi if [[ $IS_ZFS = false ]] then df $CUR_PATH | tail -1 | awk '{print $2" "$4}' else USED=$((`zfs get -o value -Hp used $CUR_PATH` / 1024)) > /dev/null AVAIL=$((`zfs get -o value -Hp available $CUR_PATH` / 1024)) > /dev/null TOTAL=$(($USED+$AVAIL)) > /dev/null echo $TOTAL $AVAIL fi
Save the script as "dfree.sh" to /home/"yourlinuxusername" then change the ownership of the file to make it executable with this command:
sudo chmod 774 dfree.sh
Now open smb.conf with sudo again:
sudo nano /etc/samba/smb.conf
Now add this entry to the top of the configuration file to direct Samba to use the results of our script when Windows asks for a reading on the pool's used/available/total drive space:
[global]
dfree command = /home/"yourlinuxusername"/dfree.sh
Save the changes to smb.conf and then restart Samba again with the terminal:
sudo systemctl restart smbd
Now there’s one more thing we need to do to fully set up the Samba share, and that’s to modify a hidden group permission. In the terminal window type the following command:
usermod -a -G sambashare “yourlinuxusername”
Then restart samba again:
sudo systemctl restart smbd
If we don’t do this last step, everything will appear to work fine, and you will even be able to see and map the drive from Windows and even begin transferring files, but you'd soon run into a lot of frustration. As every ten minutes or so a file would fail to transfer and you would get a window announcing “0x8007003B Unexpected Network Error”. This window would require your manual input to continue the transfer with the file next in the queue. And at the end it would reattempt to transfer whichever files failed the first time around. 99% of the time they’ll go through that second try, but this is still all a major pain in the ass. Especially if you’ve got a lot of data to transfer or you want to step away from the computer for a while.
It turns out samba can act a little weirdly with the higher read/write speeds of RAIDz arrays and transfers from Windows, and will intermittently crash and restart itself if this group option isn’t changed. Inputting the above command will prevent you from ever seeing that window.
The last thing we're going to do before switching over to our Windows PC is grab the IP address of our Linux machine. Enter the following command:
hostname -I
This will spit out this computer's IP address on the local network (it will look something like 192.168.0.x), write it down. It might be a good idea once you're done here to go into your router settings and reserving that IP for your Linux system in the DHCP settings. Check the manual for your specific model router on how to access its settings, typically it can be accessed by opening a browser and typing http:\\192.168.0.1 in the address bar, but your router may be different.
Okay we’re done with our Linux computer for now. Get on over to your Windows PC, open File Explorer, right click on Network and click "Map network drive". Select Z: as the drive letter (you don't want to map the network drive to a letter you could conceivably be using for other purposes) and enter the IP of your Linux machine and location of the share like so: \\"LINUXCOMPUTERLOCALIPADDRESSGOESHERE"\"zpoolnamegoeshere"\. Windows will then ask you for your username and password, enter the ones you set earlier in Samba and you're good. If you've done everything right it should look something like this:
You can now start moving media over from Windows to the share folder. It's a good idea to have a hard line running to all machines. Moving files over Wi-Fi is going to be tortuously slow, the only thing that’s going to make the transfer time tolerable (hours instead of days) is a solid wired connection between both machines and your router.
Step Six: Setting Up Remote Desktop Access to Your Server
After the server is up and going, you’ll want to be able to access it remotely from Windows. Barring serious maintenance/updates, this is how you'll access it most of the time. On your Linux system open the terminal and enter:
sudo apt install xrdp
Then:
sudo systemctl enable xrdp
Once it's finished installing, open “Settings” on the sidebar and turn off "automatic login" in the User category. Then log out of your account. Attempting to remotely connect to your Linux computer while you’re logged in will result in a black screen!
Now get back on your Windows PC, open search and look for "RDP". A program called "Remote Desktop Connection" should pop up, open this program as an administrator by right-clicking and selecting “run as an administrator”. You’ll be greeted with a window. In the field marked “Computer” type in the IP address of your Linux computer. Press connect and you'll be greeted with a new window and prompt asking for your username and password. Enter your Ubuntu username and password here.
If everything went right, you’ll be logged into your Linux computer. If the performance is sluggish, adjust the display options. Lowering the resolution and colour depth do a lot to make the interface feel snappier.
Remote access is how we're going to be using our Linux system from now, barring edge cases like needing to get into the BIOS or upgrading to a new version of Ubuntu. Everything else from performing maintenance like a monthly zpool scrub to checking zpool status and updating software can all be done remotely.
This is how my server lives its life now, happily humming and chirping away on the floor next to the couch in a corner of the living room.
Step Seven: Plex Media Server/Jellyfin
Okay we’ve got all the ground work finished and our server is almost up and running. We’ve got Ubuntu up and running, our storage array is primed, we’ve set up remote connections and sharing, and maybe we’ve moved over some of favourite movies and TV shows.
Now we need to decide on the media server software to use which will stream our media to us and organize our library. For most people I’d recommend Plex. It just works 99% of the time. That said, Jellyfin has a lot to recommend it by too, even if it is rougher around the edges. Some people run both simultaneously, it’s not that big of an extra strain. I do recommend doing a little bit of your own research into the features each platform offers, but as a quick run down, consider some of the following points:
Plex is closed source and is funded through PlexPass purchases while Jellyfin is open source and entirely user driven. This means a number of things: for one, Plex requires you to purchase a “PlexPass” (purchased as a one time lifetime fee $159.99 CDN/$120 USD or paid for on a monthly or yearly subscription basis) in order to access to certain features, like hardware transcoding (and we want hardware transcoding) or automated intro/credits detection and skipping, Jellyfin offers some of these features for free through plugins. Plex supports a lot more devices than Jellyfin and updates more frequently. That said, Jellyfin's Android and iOS apps are completely free, while the Plex Android and iOS apps must be activated for a one time cost of $6 CDN/$5 USD. But that $6 fee gets you a mobile app that is much more functional and features a unified UI across platforms, the Plex mobile apps are simply a more polished experience. The Jellyfin apps are a bit of a mess and the iOS and Android versions are very different from each other.
Jellyfin’s actual media player is more fully featured than Plex's, but on the other hand Jellyfin's UI, library customization and automatic media tagging really pale in comparison to Plex. Streaming your music library is free through both Jellyfin and Plex, but Plex offers the PlexAmp app for dedicated music streaming which boasts a number of fantastic features, unfortunately some of those fantastic features require a PlexPass. If your internet is down, Jellyfin can still do local streaming, while Plex can fail to play files unless you've got it set up a certain way. Jellyfin has a slew of neat niche features like support for Comic Book libraries with the .cbz/.cbt file types, but then Plex offers some free ad-supported TV and films, they even have a free channel that plays nothing but Classic Doctor Who.
Ultimately it's up to you, I settled on Plex because although some features are pay-walled, it just works. It's more reliable and easier to use, and a one-time fee is much easier to swallow than a subscription. I had a pretty easy time getting my boomer parents and tech illiterate brother introduced to and using Plex and I don't know if I would've had as easy a time doing that with Jellyfin. I do also need to mention that Jellyfin does take a little extra bit of tinkering to get going in Ubuntu, you’ll have to set up process permissions, so if you're more tolerant to tinkering, Jellyfin might be up your alley and I’ll trust that you can follow their installation and configuration guide. For everyone else, I recommend Plex.
So pick your poison: Plex or Jellyfin.
Note: The easiest way to download and install either of these packages in Ubuntu is through Snap Store.
After you've installed one (or both), opening either app will launch a browser window into the browser version of the app allowing you to set all the options server side.
The process of adding creating media libraries is essentially the same in both Plex and Jellyfin. You create a separate libraries for Television, Movies, and Music and add the folders which contain the respective types of media to their respective libraries. The only difficult or time consuming aspect is ensuring that your files and folders follow the appropriate naming conventions:
Plex naming guide for Movies
Plex naming guide for Television
Jellyfin follows the same naming rules but I find their media scanner to be a lot less accurate and forgiving than Plex. Once you've selected the folders to be scanned the service will scan your files, tagging everything and adding metadata. Although I find do find Plex more accurate, it can still erroneously tag some things and you might have to manually clean up some tags in a large library. (When I initially created my library it tagged the 1963-1989 Doctor Who as some Korean soap opera and I needed to manually select the correct match after which everything was tagged normally.) It can also be a bit testy with anime (especially OVAs) be sure to check TVDB to ensure that you have your files and folders structured and named correctly. If something is not showing up at all, double check the name.
Once that's done, organizing and customizing your library is easy. You can set up collections, grouping items together to fit a theme or collect together all the entries in a franchise. You can make playlists, and add custom artwork to entries. It's fun setting up collections with posters to match, there are even several websites dedicated to help you do this like PosterDB. As an example, below are two collections in my library, one collecting all the entries in a franchise, the other follows a theme.
My Star Trek collection, featuring all eleven television series, and thirteen films.
My Best of the Worst collection, featuring sixty-nine films previously showcased on RedLetterMedia’s Best of the Worst. They’re all absolutely terrible and I love them.
As for settings, ensure you've got Remote Access going, it should work automatically and be sure to set your upload speed after running a speed test. In the library settings set the database cache to 2000MB to ensure a snappier and more responsive browsing experience, and then check that playback quality is set to original/maximum. If you’re severely bandwidth limited on your upload and have remote users, you might want to limit the remote stream bitrate to something more reasonable, just as a note of comparison Netflix’s 1080p bitrate is approximately 5Mbps, although almost anyone watching through a chromium based browser is streaming at 720p and 3mbps. Other than that you should be good to go. For actually playing your files, there's a Plex app for just about every platform imaginable. I mostly watch television and films on my laptop using the Windows Plex app, but I also use the Android app which can broadcast to the chromecast connected to the TV in the office and the Android TV app for our smart TV. Both are fully functional and easy to navigate, and I can also attest to the OS X version being equally functional.
Part Eight: Finding Media
Now, this is not really a piracy tutorial, there are plenty of those out there. But if you’re unaware, BitTorrent is free and pretty easy to use, just pick a client (qBittorrent is the best) and go find some public trackers to peruse. Just know now that all the best trackers are private and invite only, and that they can be exceptionally difficult to get into. I’m already on a few, and even then, some of the best ones are wholly out of my reach.
If you decide to take the left hand path and turn to Usenet you’ll have to pay. First you’ll need to sign up with a provider like Newshosting or EasyNews for access to Usenet itself, and then to actually find anything you’re going to need to sign up with an indexer like NZBGeek or NZBFinder. There are dozens of indexers, and many people cross post between them, but for more obscure media it’s worth checking multiple. You’ll also need a binary downloader like SABnzbd. That caveat aside, Usenet is faster, bigger, older, less traceable than BitTorrent, and altogether slicker. I honestly prefer it, and I'm kicking myself for taking this long to start using it because I was scared off by the price. I’ve found so many things on Usenet that I had sought in vain elsewhere for years, like a 2010 Italian film about a massacre perpetrated by the SS that played the festival circuit but never received a home media release; some absolute hero uploaded a rip of a festival screener DVD to Usenet. Anyway, figure out the rest of this shit on your own and remember to use protection, get yourself behind a VPN, use a SOCKS5 proxy with your BitTorrent client, etc.
On the legal side of things, if you’re around my age, you (or your family) probably have a big pile of DVDs and Blu-Rays sitting around unwatched and half forgotten. Why not do a bit of amateur media preservation, rip them and upload them to your server for easier access? (Your tools for this are going to be Handbrake to do the ripping and AnyDVD to break any encryption.) I went to the trouble of ripping all my SCTV DVDs (five box sets worth) because none of it is on streaming nor could it be found on any pirate source I tried. I’m glad I did, forty years on it’s still one of the funniest shows to ever be on TV.
Part Nine/Epilogue: Sonarr/Radarr/Lidarr and Overseerr
There are a lot of ways to automate your server for better functionality or to add features you and other users might find useful. Sonarr, Radarr, and Lidarr are a part of a suite of “Servarr” services (there’s also Readarr for books and Whisparr for adult content) that allow you to automate the collection of new episodes of TV shows (Sonarr), new movie releases (Radarr) and music releases (Lidarr). They hook in to your BitTorrent client or Usenet binary newsgroup downloader and crawl your preferred Torrent trackers and Usenet indexers, alerting you to new releases and automatically grabbing them. You can also use these services to manually search for new media, and even replace/upgrade your existing media with better quality uploads. They’re really a little tricky to set up on a bare metal Ubuntu install (ideally you should be running them in Docker Containers), and I won’t be providing a step by step on installing and running them, I’m simply making you aware of their existence.
The other bit of kit I want to make you aware of is Overseerr which is a program that scans your Plex media library and will serve recommendations based on what you like. It also allows you and your users to request specific media. It can even be integrated with Sonarr/Radarr/Lidarr so that fulfilling those requests is fully automated.
And you're done. It really wasn't all that hard. Enjoy your media. Enjoy the control you have over that media. And be safe in the knowledge that no hedgefund CEO motherfucker who hates the movies but who is somehow in control of a major studio will be able to disappear anything in your library as a tax write-off.
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thanks @random-tail and @enamoredfey for the questions! i'll let Sun himself answer:
long-story short, Sun doesn’t believe he has emotions since he is a robot 😔
of course, he sees Moon and Eclipse emote all the time. he usually attributes it to Moon being a fool (believing he is something he's not) and Eclipse being manipulative (given that he was originally built for the theater)
but there is a part of him that wonders if he is missing something—he just doesn’t understand what that is
Note: i should also mention, his voice is almost completely monotone. the closet idea of a voice claim for this Sun is Greg Chun's voice for Lukas from Fire Emblem Echoes—fairly even in tone, somewhat soft
#ask the crab#fnaf sun#fnaf dca#dca fandom#Have You Eaten? AU#Sun Have You Eaten? AU#crab art#digital art#bright colours#Sun's character was the first one of the three that i figured out#i thought it would be cool to explore a Sun who isn't genuinely bubbly nor does he know how to act the part#he is a machine made to fulfill a purpose#and yeah leaving the ruined plex and becoming a chef was a big change for him#but serving customers out of sight from the kitchen wasn't too drastic a change#so he pours his efforts into his new role#he's also SO unintentionally funny#just logical deadpan and blunt to a fault#he's basically the no-nonsense straight man of the comedic trio#but don't worry#whenever i get to writing their story#Sunny will learn how to love#it's just going to take a while to get there#and it won't look the same as with Moon or Eclipse#but he will get there in his own way
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this loser plex worker oc thats been living in my head
#rubulart#fnaf security breach#comics#montgomery gator#monty gator#glamrock chica#roxanne wolf#five nights at freddy's#fnaf#fnaf fanart#fnaf sb#loser plex worker au
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no i dont think pizza plex fics/aus are overdone or boring. i literally NEVER get tired of it!!
it brings me joy seeing these animatronics fall in love, develop meaningful relationships, and somehow miraculously survive the pizzaplex being ON FIRE over and over again
im shaking hands with every Y/N who ends up kissing the robots or just having an incredibly deep bond that isn't quite romantic or platonic and is actually a secret third thing that is incredibly gay after a series of near death experiences!!! <33
#pingyappathon#dca fandom#fnaf daycare attendant#sorry eby thoughts are plagueing me and how i need to continuw writing my plex fic even though im working on other things rn#something something y/n being the barbie of fanfics amen
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AI could never recreate whatever the hell goes on in my head



#wow guys spiderman: meet the crossoverse looks great so far#atsv#across the spiderverse#spiderman#spiderverse#spiderman across the spiderverse#spider man india#pavitr prabhakar#heather mason#silent hill#dw read#saul goodman#jimmy mcgill#better call saul#ezio auditore#assassin's creed#ac ezio#plex yo gabba gabba#yo gabba gabba#my art
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Powerplex must have been in heaven during the Invincible War
#Invincible#amazon prime#invincible season 3#omni man#nolan grayson#debbie grayson#oliver grayson#mark grayson#atomeve#rexsplode#robot#monster girl#black samson#bulletproof#duplikate#immortal#shapesmith#gardians of the globe#cecil stedman#donald ferguson#battle beast#angstrom levy#power plex#allen the alien#anissa#multi paul#viltrum#viltrumite#marvel#spider man
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