Hi, I'm Alston. I am an Infrastructure Engineer based in the UK. I write about technology and self-hosting. I make short videos on Tech on my YouTube channel. . (more)
Jan. 31, 2026
The Cloud Resume Challenge was something I thought was a basic project to host to a resume on a cloud provider but it is a practical demonstration of real-world cloud engineering skills. Over several weeks, I built, automated, tested and deployed a fully serverless application using AWS and modern DevOps practices.
This post breaks down the journey end to end.
Part 1: Static Website and Cloud Foundations I built a simple HTML and CSS resume and hosted it on Amazon S3.
Nov. 9, 2025
If you travel frequently, work remotely, or spend a lot of time connecting to public Wi-Fi, having your own secure and private network isn’t a luxury it’s a necessity. That’s where the GL.iNet Opal (GL-SFT1200) comes in.
This compact, dual-band travel router is designed for people who want fast, reliable, and privacy-focused internet access anywhere in the world. Despite its small size and budget-friendly price, the Opal packs features usually found in much more expensive routers.
Nov. 9, 2025
Recently decided to get rid of my home broadband provided router (Amazon Eero) with an enterprise grade firewall features, without burning a hole in my wallet, using the Topton N100 mini PC. In this guide, I will walk through installing OPNsense, one of the most powerful open-source firewall platforms available today on this tiny box.
My goal is to have segmentation in my home network, blocking ads at the edge and just showing my friends my home lab which they have 0 interest in :D