
Ask HN: What does self-hosting mean? - mycloud
Out of curiosity, I went to the wikipedia page https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Self-hosting to read up on self-hosting. I run several web services on my own server and was pretty much sure the term means that, but how come the wikipedia article does not even mention this with a single word?<p>Searching here reveals apparently both use-cases for the term. There is a subreddit &#x2F;r&#x2F;selfhosted which in contrast to the wikipedia article only deals with hosting server software.<p>I wonder if I miss something entirely and what the connection between the two use-cases is, or is there none at all?
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brudgers
Self-hosting is often used to describe running SaaS products (software as a
service) on one's own hardware rather than on the SaaS vendor's servers.

Self-hosting is often important for companies with significant privacy,
confidentiality, and security risks or governed by data protection
regulations.

Wikipedia is Wikipedia. It improves over time, but these days more slowly.

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dozzie
> Self-hosting is the use of a computer program as part of the toolchain or
> operating system [...]

There you have it. The article talks about the term from around compilers, not
web services.

By the way, what you mean by "self-hosting" is usually described with the term
"on-premises software".

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mycloud
Ok that is just quoting the wikipedia article, my question though was if that
is actually the only correct usage of the term, since searching on google
reveals pretty much only what you refer to as "on-premises software". Somehow
this is strange to me that so many people are off, thus my question in the
first place.

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dozzie
> my question though was if that is actually the only correct usage of the
> term

Is the meaning of "server" the only correct usage of the word "host"? Because
it's the same situation.

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mycloud
At least in those situations wikipedia does not have a single answer, which is
what I would have expected for self-hosting as well. Especially given the
quite different use-cases of it. That triggered my question.

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twobyfour
The great thing about Wikipedia is that when it's inaccurate or confusing, you
can correct it yourself!

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mycloud
Indeed. Thought it would be good to get knowledgeable feedback here about the
issue.

