Mastodawn

Okay, so I've set up my own Mastodon instance and so far it has not been a fun experience. I have zero confidence in my ability to keep this running so let's see how it goes.

To anyone of the on a single-user instance, how to you deal with getting the federated timeline populated? (I realise that at this point no one will see this post but still)

notorious rgb Jan 12, 2023

@uoou you can add relays to your instance or just do what I did back in 2018 on my old instance which was to follow the admin of every mastodon instance in existence.

@uoou
Not a single user instance, but here are 2 things that can help out.

1) Check out instance relays. Basically connects your instance to a whole bunch of other instances. No need to follow other people!
2) Start following a bunch of people you might know. The more people you follow, the more likely you are to have a busier timeline. You can also use tools like https://fediverse.info/explore/people and https://communitywiki.org/trunk to find people with interests of yours

fediverse.info

The bespoke fediverse guide and people directory.

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@gregandcin That's really useful, thank you.

@uoou Not a problem! Also, I didn't make it super clear, but the Federated timeline shows all the posts from people you follow, people your follows follow, and any boosts from people you follow. Relays also populate the federated timeline

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@gregandcin Feel free to tell me to go google it but how to relays work from the point of view of setup?

@uoou Under the "Administration" tab, there is a relays option. You add a relay, which is just a URL, and then posts get federated if you are accepted. A lot of them auto-accept instances, but always check. A simple search of "Mastodon Relay" should give you some results

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@gregandcin Ahhhh, that's great. Thank you so much for this.

@uoou Not a problem! Always glad to help

pinkprius [ger]Jan 12, 2023

@uoou you have to follow a lot of people.
Or you could join a relay.

El Perro Negro Jan 12, 2023

@uoou "The federated timeline shows all public posts from all users who are “known” to your instance. That is, it includes every user on your instance, but it also includes everyone that users on your instance follow – even if those users are on other servers. It’s not the same thing as “every user on mastodon” though."

Info from https://blog.djnavarro.net/posts/2022-11-03_what-i-know-about-mastodon/

Everything I know about Mastodon – Notes from a data witch

A hastily written guide for data science folks trying to navigate the fediverse.

Notes from a data witch

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@elperronegro That's helpful, thanks!

lamp Jan 12, 2023

@uoou add a relay like https://relay.berserker.town/inbox

@uoou congrats on making your first fedi instance! i suggest trying pleroma as it very optimised for your intended use ( single-user instance.)

eviloatmeal, resident Death Stranding 2 apologist (arch, btw)Jan 12, 2023

@uoou I wouldn't know what to tell you. I set up my Akkoma and followed the people I followed on my mason at the time and my federated timeline was chock full of stuff from the get-go. In fact, looking at the server logs the first few hours, I was a little alarmed at how much activity there was.

Moved to @[email protected]Jan 12, 2023

@uoou Hello fellow single-user admin!

My advice is to open a few interesting instances and click into their local timelines. If you see any users who look interesting, then open their profiles and copy the URLs. Then, you can paste them into the search box of your own instance and follow them. Once you've followed a few people from different instances, your federated timeline will start to populate. Then you can look for other interesting people, follow them, and repeat until you've reached a level of content that you're happy with.

Don't feel nervous about following and boosting! That's how content spreads in the #fediverse. Use hashtags! If you have general questions, then tag #mastodon or #fediverse. #MastoAdmin is great if you have questions about running your instance.

PS - once you get used to mastodon, I recommend trying a fork like glitch-soc. Forks offer fancy features like markdown, better filters, quote boosts, longer posts, and UI tweaks.

f00f/eris/continuum/etc Jan 12, 2023

@uoou well, someone boosted it onto my timeline!

i have honestly never tried hosting a fedi server, but i think relays (https://joinfediverse.wiki/Fediverse_relays) may be your best bet; just be careful the ones you subscribe to aren't relaying lots of servers you don't want to see. otherwise just find handles for people you want to follow, and follow them.

Fediverse relays - Join the Fediverse

Stan Jan 12, 2023

@uoou Congrats on setting up and running your own instance! Even though it wasn't a fun experience

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@wasabi It's (unsurprisingly) far more fun now it's working!

Stan Jan 12, 2023

@uoou Yeah that's usually the case on most of my projects, sucks to dive into documentation, struggling to understand APIs or libraries, then once it's all set up it's the fun part.

Then again I never tried to set up my own instance so I can't picture what you've been through but I can imagine

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@wasabi I was all just so fragile. If I did one small thing wrong everything was left in a state I couldn't fix, so I had to start again.

All my fault of course, but still frustrating.

But yeah, no other way to learn!

@uoou I just follow people. My instance has propagated through people I have interacted with. Its slow though.

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@amoonrabbit The relays seem to work. And instantly. I have a healthy federated timeline now after adding a handful of them.

Michael Jan 12, 2023

@uoou imo this is the best way:

https://reddit.com/r/Mastodon/comments/107c6z3/_/j3mixyz/?context=1

Far more targeted than relays.

Relay questions

Have a look at the following two options: 1. [https://github.com/g3rv4/FakeRelay/](https://github.com/g3rv4/FakeRelay/) (ideally together with...

reddit

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@michael That's an interesting way to do it.

I actually like the untargeted nature of relays - I want my federated tijmeline to be wild and weird and diverse.

But the thing you linked will also be useful, so thank you!

Michael Jan 12, 2023

@uoou the problem with un targeted is space:

When I was connected to a few relays my media storage ballooned to > 200 GB (with a 7 day cache retention, on a single user instance)

Personally I never look at my federated timeline anyway: it’s way too busy …

Ultimately it was pulling in a huge amount of content, but I was only ever seeing a tiny percentage of it, so it seemed like a huge waste.

But clearly each has their advantage. There is no right or wrong way.

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@michael Ahhhh, shit, that's worth bearing in mind. I'll disable them and see how it feels cos storage space is an issue.

Michael Jan 12, 2023

@uoou is recommend using block storage for your media anyway.

Backblaze B2 is what I use.

@uoou @michael Here's a good post on how you can deal with storage space issues: https://ricard.dev/improving-mastodons-disk-usage/

Improving Mastodon's disk usage - Ricard Torres dev

Mastodon's built-in CLI gives you the availability to clean attachments and previews from remote accounts, purging the disk cache. This is fantastic and

Ricard Torres dev

uoou Jan 13, 2023

@moira @michael Ooooh, thanks!

@uoou The problem with relays is that they don't have their own blocklists, and you'll get nazi bullshit.

So set up your own, _first_. I suggest wandering.shop's public list. _Then_ start relaying. I use these relays for (mostly) English-language content:

https://relay.fedi.agency/inbox

https://mastodon-relay.thedoodleproject.net/inbox

https://relay.intahnet.co.uk/inbox

That's a heavy UK and Europe bias of course. If you want Japanese content:

https://relay.toot.yukimochi.jp/inbox

uoou Jan 13, 2023

@moira That's extremely useful, thank you!

@uoou As I'm _not_ single-user but small userbase (15 at the moment), I maintain a Librarian account which I use to follow any interesting accounts which may and may not interest me in particular. Here's that for you, its follow list is public:

Marcus "MajorLinux" Summers Jan 12, 2023

@uoou Luckily, with someone retweeting you, I saw your post in my federated timeline.

Honestly, the best way to fill it is to follow people.

Over time, it'll fill up with more and more people!

let's regular posting Jan 12, 2023

@uoou because it's just you on the instance, your federated timeline is always going to be just the people you yourself are following (it's only ever "all the posts from the combination of all people that people on the server are following", no server is ever seeing more of the fediverse than that), unless you subscribe to some relays: https://joinfediverse.wiki/index.php?title=Fediverse_relays&mobileaction=toggle_view_desktop

Fediverse relays - Join the Fediverse

let's regular posting Jan 12, 2023

@uoou (then it will be "everybody you're following, plus the relay server's federated timeline")

Johnny Normality (Feral Mode)Jan 12, 2023

@uoou
Follow people. It will take a few days but you'll see more and more of the network over time.

Alternatively, you could join a relay to speed up the process.

Jan 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈🇨🇦Jan 12, 2023

@uoou On a single-user instance, I think the Federated timeline will always more or less match your home timeline. If you had more than one user, the Federated timeline would be the combination of the public toots that appear on each user's home timeline. At least that's what I've noticed from mine!

When I want to see a lot of posts from people I don't follow, I go to the federated feed of a larger server, like:

https://mastodon.social/public

You'll have to do some copy'n'paste to interact, though.

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@jan That's an interesting option, thanks.

aka ginger Jan 12, 2023

@uoou following folks, cruising hashtags, and people boosting your things should help populate it :)

Clair (KD3BCC)Jan 12, 2023

@gingerrroot @uoou emphasizing this.

matthew - retroedge.tech Jan 12, 2023

Your post got boosted by a few people, so I see it.

Mastodon is probably one of the most complicated fediverse servers to run and maintain. If it breaks on you, feel free to take a look at other options.

Our self-hosted social.retroedge.tech is using Pleroma.

#fediverse #mastodon #pleroma #selfhosting #selfhost

RetroEdgeTech

The Secretbatcave Jan 12, 2023

@uoou I’ve not managed to get relays running. It’s not that much of a problem as I have a critical mass of people to follow.

I might look at it one day, along with proper lists.

andyc Jan 12, 2023

@uoou You could try adding some relays to pull in more content.

Reto Jan 12, 2023

@uoou follow other people agressively

Deborah Pickett Jan 12, 2023

@uoou You need to connect to a relay. Find a relay that already connects like-minded hosts, and join it. Your instance's timeline will be shared to the relay, and you'll receive all the local timelines from other instances connected to the relay in return. I connect Old Mermaid Town to https://relay.gay/ for instance.

relay.gay | ActivityPub Relay

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@futzle Just to check, and I hope you don't mind my bothering you...

I think this is right but want to be sure. If I completely fuck this server up but have a database backup, I can recreate the server, follow the installation, populate the database from the backup before running the mastodon setup thingy. And then be roughly where I was, right?

Deborah Pickett Jan 12, 2023

@uoou Yes, ish. The two bits that you must must have backups of are the random secrets in the .env.production file and a copy of the Postgres database. If you restore those, you'll be able to resume federation with other instances, though there might be missed posts in both directions around the time of the restore because of the asynchronous nature of sidekiq queues.

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@futzle Didn't know the secrets were kept there, thanks.

You've been enormously helpful, thank you.

@uoou much chat up @jimcarroll who is on his own instance

Michael Veale Jan 12, 2023

@uoou we're not a single user instance, but a small one. initially, we set up an account, @computer, which we could manually import public opt-in lists into to populate the federated timeline (in our case, with mostly tech policy people, academics of various flavours, selected topic journalists)

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@mikarv @computer I'm not at all clear on what lists are. Is this a part of Mastodon that I've totally overlooked?

Michael Veale Jan 12, 2023

@uoou @computer somewhat less important now, were a method to overcome the cold start problem for the many people moving from twitter without an established social network on fedi, or many of those with shared interests already being present https://nathanlesage.github.io/academics-on-mastodon/#curated-account-lists

Academics on Mastodon

A list of various lists consisting of academics on Mastodon

academics-on-mastodon

uoou Jan 12, 2023

@mikarv @computer Oh that's super useful, thanks.

Is there a mechanism for importing a list or is it just a case of doing it manually?

Michael Veale Jan 13, 2023

@uoou @computer just as a csv in settings, import.

Nixie Jan 12, 2023

@uoou By following people with interests in their bios thst align with my own(single user instance here too)

Anathema Device Jan 12, 2023

josh Jan 12, 2023

@anathema_device just follow a bunch of people and the federated timeline will fill up. You could also try adding some relays in the admin section :)

Anathema Device Jan 13, 2023

@josh sorry, I meant this to be advice to the OP. I'll copy your reply over to them