i’d like to make one but i don’t know how to code, for one, and also don’t know if it’s something i can just make on my ipad or if it needs a lot of resources.
For a smaller instance I would always go with PieFed, it’s much much easier to set up and to maintain, uses way less resources and has basically the same feature set.
Resources:
- small VPS like the smallest from Hetzner for example
- Linux installed on it
- Postgresql database
- Python 3 and pip installed
- domain to point to that server
- letsencrypt certificate to run it with https which is necessary to federate
I think that should be it.
If you mean running the lemmy software on your own hardware to have your own instance, you don’t need programming skills for that. Self-hosting things is a related but different skillset. There’s a decent learning curve, though.
If you are familiar with self-hosting, you can probably set up a Lemmy instance pretty easily. If you are not, then running a publically federating service is probably not a good starting point. You should be able to search up a beginners guide to self-hosting, or take a look at !selfhosted@lemmy.world. I think hosting a personal wiki is a good starting point, since it is then a good place to write down everything you’ve learnt!
An iPad isn’t really a good server. You could use an old laptop or pay for a cheap VPS as a starting point. Many people start with a Raspberry Pi.
