Products · Broad category
Self-hosted software
Raised as a usability problem by 32 people on Hacker News over 14 years (2013–2026), in 29 threads.
This is a broad category rather than one product, so its issues aren't ranked on the home page.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads this year.
Every issue, all time, most people first
Self-hosting setup is too complicated and time-consumingUnreviewed
20132026- Self-hosted apps need docker-level setup, out of reach for non-technical people2025-07-05
- Self-hosting needs constant updates, breaks often, and is clunky to run2025-06-07
- Self-hosted services offer so many options that single-click installs and upgrades are impossible2025-01-31
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 31 complaints
- Upgrades require a complex guide, a full backup, tearing everything down, and hoping the migration works2026-10-16
- Scrolling is slow to respond in Firefox2026-02-28
- Self-hosted apps need docker-level setup, out of reach for non-technical people2025-07-05
- Self-hosting needs constant updates, breaks often, and is clunky to run2025-06-07
- Hard to find the repository and search code without checking it out2025-05-13
- No way to bulk delete contacts, forcing one-by-one deletion that was too tedious2025-04-11
- Self-hosting a voice assistant is a hassle; no middle ground between cloud and DIY2025-03-16
- Self-hosted services offer so many options that single-click installs and upgrades are impossible2025-01-31
- Imports only half the collection; duplicates albums and mangles or drops messy metadata and CUE files2023-06-20
- Self-hosted chat and video tools had wonky UX and networking glitches, making them painful to use2023-05-03
- Hard to figure out how to set it up and which version to use, and error messages are difficult to interpret2022-11-24
- Past tunnel apps required configuring router ports, firewall, VPN and Little Snitch rules2022-07-28
- Hard to know if the mail server is correctly configured2022-07-07
- Simple shell-based self-hosting breaks on video seeking and offers no encryption or authentication2022-03-28
- Connecting to a self-hosted device needs manual certificate and network setup2022-03-24
- Self-hosting a podcast takes too much effort to figure out RSS, distribution and storage2022-03-24
- Securing a self-hosted install needs many scattered steps across different config files2022-03-23
- Self-hosting is so overcomplicated the commenter has no idea how to do it2022-01-07
- Hosting and self-hosted social tools are confusing and need too much knowledge to set up and use2021-11-04
- Hard to contribute, and code can't be searched on the web without cloning2021-07-04
- Installing self-hosted server apps is ludicrously complicated and time-consuming for non-technical users2021-04-14
- Self-hosting setup is too complicated and time-consuming to manage2021-04-07
- Hard to find a workflow covering many apps; setup is too complicated to manage2021-04-07
- Mail server setup needs many separate components and lots of glue configuration2021-03-11
- Self-hosted software is too complicated to set up, so people end up using SaaS2020-08-27
- Setup takes half a day of config, searching and documentation despite advertised 5-minute setup2020-06-08
- Sync only works while the app is open, so photos don't back up automatically2020-03-11
- Getting friends' updates through forums or self-hosted blogs is horrendous to use2019-06-04
- Running your own mail server takes enormous time debugging many separate components2018-01-27
- Hard to configure and can't find encryption option in settings2013-07-22
- Page elements overlap into a garbled layout on mobile screens2013-05-13