Can it be programmed without the app?

Not as far as I can tell. You need the phone app to program it via Bluetooth. I suspect that the app has all of the codes and does not need connectivity once you’ve downloaded it, but the database of codes would live in the app and not in the remote hardware.
I would prefer another Harmony to the Sofabaton U2, but the Harmony still relies on an app to program it. Unfortunately, according to this
https://support.myharmony.com/en-us/download#harmonyRemote7x
the software is no longer available, and even if you could snag it you wouldn’t be able to make a new account to use it (obviously it’s bullshit that you need an account, but c’est la vie.) Basiclly: Harmony had good hardware and bad software, the Sofabaton is the other way around.

I bought a Sofabaton U2 to replace my worn-out Harmony and it’s… okay. The main frustration is the buttons. You really have to mash them to get them to register, and way the remote is designed the IR signal gets weaker as the batteries fade, which can be really frustrating. The wheel that chooses your program has also become very flaky.
That said, the app for programming it is better than Logitec’s for the Harmony. If you’re in there frequently to set up control of different hotel TVs it should be fairly easy.

My primary server is an Acer laptop running Debian. It ran on power with no modification or trouble for a couple of years, but I heard some horror stories about spicy pillows so I found a way to clamp the battery’s charge level to 80%. Now it just sits there like that. I know how to do it with an Acer laptop - not sure about Dell.
But nothing has burnt down and it’s been running for several years.

Why let perfect be the enemy of good?

You must be new here (Lemmy).

I use the Swiftfin client since I’m not willing to pay a subscription for Infuse. It works fine for video, except the major pain point for me is that it doesn’t refresh automatically, and you can’t refresh from within the app. So if you want to see new items on your server, you have to force-quit / swipe away Swiftfin and reopen it.

I’m not sure how it does it, but my Synology NAS can act as a Time Machine server and my laptop backs up to it, no cloud involved. So I know it’s possible, but I don’t know what kind of open source solutions are available.

I use Obsidian with a folder for hardware and a folder for software, then an entry for each device or service. I’ve been pretty good about maintaining cross-links.
I kind of wish I used Docker Compose more, but I haven’t run into a situation where it’s been a problem yet.

But what’s the point of downvoting on Lemmy? It doesn’t seem to affect visibility. Or maybe there’s a setting somewhere I need to adjust?

Exactly. Post it to a Programming forum because… you know, computers and stuff.

I still don’t understand the point of downvoting here since it doesn’t seem to affect visibility. You’ll have the dumbest take on something sitting there at -36 and I still have to look at it.

I’m on both. If you only want to follow techies, go with Mastodon. If you want to follow non-techies or celebrities or whatever, go with Bluesky.

I have pihole running on an old Raspberry Pi B and it just chugs along. Except for the wonky update they put out a few months ago. That took some cleaning up after.
I check the dashboard a few times a day and it’s a good way to notice network issues and misbehaving programs.
I’m also running it through cloudflared to encrypt the requests, in case my ISP is snooping on them.

It displays fine by default, but the image only updates every several seconds. I’m talking about a live video feed, which needs some kind of special frame which has to be bolted onto HA somehow.

I haven’t, that’s the problem. It seems like it’s possible, but I’ve given up trying for the moment.

I have a Reolink PoE camera. It works fine. As far as I can tell, it only uses the internet to check for updates and set the time, but I have it blocked off anyway. Home Assistant was actually causing it to check for updates, too, so that got disabled.
I don’t record, so I can’t help you there.
I will say that is a pain to get Home Assistant to display real-time video instead of a slide show.

Right? Has this ever worked for anyone? I’ve never bothered because of how easy it is for spammers to bypass.

I run it for my pi-hole. It’s been great. It tells you when there are package updates when you log in, which I find helpful.

I went with Debian and I use Docker for containers. I considered Proxmox, but I didn’t end up trying it. PiHole is a good application for the Pi Zero (I have an early generation Pi dedicated to running PiHole), but you could also run it on the Beelink.

I strongly recommend you download Obsidian and keep hyperlinked notes on everything you do and links to every tutorial/resource you end up using.
Have a place to keep all the passwords your services will end up needing. A password manager is the best option. Make the password on your admin account on Debian (or whatever) easy to remember and enter, since you’ll need to sudo a lot.
If the Beelink comes with a copy of Windows installed, you can recover the key from within Linux with the following command:
sudo strings /sys/firmware/acpi/tables/MSDM
Then you have a spare Windows key should you ever need one.