Keep Track of Your Belongings by Self-Hosting HomeBox on Raspberry Pi
Over the course of a lifetime, humans acquire a lot of stuff. Keeping track of the things you own can be difficult and time-consuming.
HomeBox is a self-hosted web app that runs on the Raspberry Pi. It helps you to track and organize an inventory, and manage your belongings and their details.
Why Install HomeBox on Raspberry Pi?
If you’ve been in your home for more than a few years and haven’t adopted the Marie Kondo approach to keeping your life free from clutter, then the odds are good that you own a lot of stuff.
There are probably half a dozen computers in various states of repair. Ancient hi-fi systems in the loft, acoustics and electrics from that time you decided tolearn to play guitar, and various outdoortools to help you improve your gardening. That’s not even mentioning the sackfuls of old cables, chargers, and power packs. So if you need to find your leaf blower in a hurry, it can be difficult.
Likewise, if you want to make a warranty claim because the motor burned out, you need to know when and where you bought it, along with receipts, details of warranty length and how to make claims.
While there are plenty ofapps that can help you create an inventory of belongingsand documents, you will have to pay for them, unlock features with in-app purchases, or put up with a clunky spreadsheet interface.
HomeBox is a complete solution for your home inventory needs that offers image and document upload, nested locations, and additional features such as the ability to generate printable QR code labels to keep track of your worldly wares.
How to Install HomeBox on Your Raspberry Pi
HomeBox is fairly simple to deploy, although if you plan on accessing it away from your home network, you should follow our guide toset up your Raspberry Pi as a web server. Make sure youmanually install the latest version of Docker Compose.
Now create a directory for HomeBox and use thecdcommand to move into it:
Use the nano text editor to create a Docker Compose file:
In it, paste the following:
You can further configure your HomeBox instance by setting certain options in the environment section. For instance adding:
…will disallow new user registration. You may want to add this after creating your own account.
Save and exit nano withCtrl + OthenCtrl + X, then bring up Docker Compose in detached mode with:
The process will take mere seconds. When it completes, you’re able to visit your HomeBox instance in a web browser atyour-pi-local-ip-address:3100.
To access your HomeBox instance over the internet, visit your domain registrar and add a new A record inAdvanced DNS options. Set theHostto ‘@’ and the value field to your IP address. Set the TTL (Time to Lease) value as low as possible, then save.
Back on the Raspberry Pi, create a new config file for Apache:
Paste the following into the new file, taking care to substitute your own domain name:
Save and exit nano withCtrl + OthenCtrl + X, then enable the conf file and restart Apache.
Certbot can automatically fetch and deploy encryption keys and certificates, so your data is protected in transit:
Select your domain name from a list, and hitEnter, then restart Apache again:
sudo service apache2 restart
Use HomeBox to Manage Your Physical Belongings
Visit your domain in a browser and clickRegister. Enter your email address, and name, then create a strong password. HomeBox doesn’t share your email address with anyone else, and it’s kept locally on your Raspberry Pi.
Once you’ve registered accounts for your household, you may want to modify yourdocker-compose.ymlfile to prevent further registrations.
Log in to your HomeBox instance by entering the email address you used to register, along with your password.
The interface is fairly straightforward, and has some preconfigured locations. At the top you’ll see quick statistics including the value of your goods, total items, and total locations. Below this are storage locations, including office, bedroom, garage, and attic.
If you don’t have a garage, attic, or any other location, just click on the name to open a detailed view. You can clickDeleteto remove the location entirely, or hitEditto change the location name to one that actually exists in your home.
TheEditpanel also allows you to write a description of the location and set a parent location. You might use this, for instance, to specify if a particular storage closet is in a bedroom, your pool house, or in the villa on your private island. You can create new locations by clickingCreate > Location.
Once you’ve created specific locations for all rooms, boxes, cupboards, and closets in your home, it’s time to start tracking items.
ClickCreate > Item / Asset, then select theParent Location; from a dropdown, assign your object a name and a description, and give it a label or tag.
When you pressCreate, you’ll be taken to the details page for the item, showing a summary of information. ClickEditto get down to the nitty-gritty. it’s possible to make notes about the item, upload images, documents, insurance details, and cost. To see all the fields, flick theAdvancedtoggle at the top left of the menu.
ClickSavewhen you’re done, to be returned to the asset overview. HomeBox will generate a QR code for each item page; you may see it by clicking on the icon at the top right.
Once you’ve inventoried your home, you’ll be able to find items using theSearchmenu, or browse the contents of your locations by clickingLocations.
Tag Your Home Inventory
As well as making it simply for you to access and assess your home inventory from your browser, HomeBox has some features that make it easier to manage in the real world. Our favorite of these is the label generator, which you can access throughTools > Label Generator.
HomeBox generates a unique QR code for each asset or location page, and the label generator will provide you with pre-formatted sheets suitable for printing on Avery 5260 label sheets.
Affix these to your belongings and you can scan them with your phone to find the details. You can also generate a complete Bill of Materials for your belongings. This is produced as aTSV (tab-separated values) filethat you can import into anygood spreadsheet program. You can also import and export your inventory asCSV (comma-separated value)files.
Customize Your HomeBox!
HomeBox supports some limited customization options, which are available underProfile. While you can style the appearance with one of 29 different themes, your choice isn’t kept on the server and is only stored locally in your browser. So, if you access your HomeBox using another browser or clear the cache, the appearance won’t last.
While you’re on theProfilepage, you can change your own details, delete your account, and set the currency format.
HomeBox Makes Organizing Your Belongings Simple!
With HomeBox running on your Raspberry Pi, you’ll never again struggle to remember where everything is or any other details about your property.
It’s also a great starter project for your Raspberry Pi. If you enjoyed setting up HomeBox, why not try one of the many great alternatives to proprietary services you can run on your Raspberry Pi?
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