In case you didn’t hear TrueNAS is going partially closed source. However, there seems to be a lack of alternatives.
Any ideas on what to move to?
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Open Media Vault with OMV Extras
I have it on Proxmox. Works like a charm
As started in other comments, TrueNAS is staying open source, only the build system is going closed source because some company was ripping them off and removing license. But the OS system itself can’t go closed source because of the gpl license.
So no need to move away if you like it.
This probably doesn’t apply to TrueNAS, but technically, it’s possible to close a GPL project. You’d need the permission of every last contributor to relicense their code, or they’d have to rewrite all the code they can’t get relicensed (e.g., someone said no or already died), or they could do it if they never accepted any pull requests because they would then be the sole copyright holder and have the freedom to relicense at their whim.
I can’t vouch for TrueNAS, but most open source projects accept pull requests because free labor, whether they’re corporate projects or not, so I’d assume they can’t freely relicense without a hell of a headache, so yeah, it’s probably staying open for the foreseeable future.
I’m surprised I haven’t seen Unraid mentioned.
I mean, I use it myself but I also get why it’s not really mentioned here, being partially closed-source as well and subscription-based on top of that.
Great. Replace partial closed source with closed source.
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I can’t see why somebody objecting to TrueNAS flirting with closed source would want to switch to a fully proprietary system like Unraid.
Open media vault
This. OMV is no-nonsense.
I setup a standard Arch install, added BTRFS, NFS, SMB, restic (for offsite backups), etc and haven’t looked back.
I installed Cockpit thinking we’d need a GUI, but syncthing just works to mirror our laptops & phones with the NAS, and with multiple versions (by syncthing) I’m happy so far
The only thing that I had issues with was Immich and (major) postgresql updates, but that’s stablising now. And, TBH, the worst thing was just having to scrap the DB and just let it rebuild it (for a few days…)
I went with BTRFS because I can “see” it with standard linux tools like gparted, clonezilla, etc. So I can backup and modify the NAS OS itself, not just my data.
Apart from updates, I haven’t touched it for years.
Plain, good old Debian. It’s not that big of a deal to do all the config in console via SSH. You do it once and you’re done, so is the web interface that important?
I said this to someone once and they accused me of being “elitist”. The simple fact is when I learned how to do this stuff, there was no such thing as a GUI for any of it. You did it on the CLI, or not at all.
(Almost the exact same experience with git, funnily enough)
I 100% agree though; the bones of the setup of my NAS (admittedly mine is Ubuntu, just because everything else I run is too) was done once 18 months ago, and most has never been touched again. Just software updates every now and then and ignore it the rest of the time.
I don’t feel like I’ve lost any functionality doing things this way, either. I discovered when a disk died that it even uses SES to light the error LED and turn on the annoying beeping noise on the JBOD, and I didn’t have to do anything to set that up. I call that a win.
Nothing wrong with wanting a web interface, but for an experienced Linux user, there is no issue going without one.
I’m not exactly an expert, but I’m comfortable enough that I can figure out most things.
I still prefer a GUI option for a lot of things.
I seem to recall reading that, but I think you have the wrong impression. I’m pretty sure it’s just there build system. They have always had two (one private for the paid stuff), and now they are just building everything “in private” not removing any source.
There are many projects that do not have open build systems, and I can understand them eanting to cut costs and simplify infrastructure.
e.g. just because redhat has a private build system and tries to restrict access to their binaries, that does not make them closed-source.
I think what you are referring to is this post https://forums.truenas.com/t/clearing-the-air-on-build-scripts/64357
There are people (likely in Asia) who are using the TrueNAS Build Tools to build versions that are no different other than removing license files and references, changing the name, changing some graphics and then selling the created ISO for profit.
The TrueNAS code is still GPLv3 and because it was that when they started using Linux base and not FreeBSD. The FreeBSD code is released under the BSD license which does allow closing of the source at any time. But here is what the internet had to say:
The BSD license is a permissive license that allows for minimal restrictions on how software can be used, modified, and distributed, including the ability to incorporate it into proprietary software. In contrast, GPLv3 is a copyleft license that requires any derivative works to also be distributed under the same GPLv3 terms, ensuring that the freedoms granted by the license are preserved.
For an actual NAS solution, meaning your primary goal is storage, then Rockstor, OpenMediaVault, and TrueNAS are the big open source ones I know of. I believe they can all do ZFS and RAID these days
If you’re looking for a system to host self hosted apps, that can also do ZFS storage, check out Incus Containers on a playing Ubuntu or Debian install, and use LXConsole for the UI side.
Straight up barebones Linux.
That’s likely what I’ll end up doing
Alpine Linux might also be interesting.
I think alpine qualifies as barebones Linux, generally.
I (very much an amateur) briefly tried TueNAS scale in the past and didn’t like how they did apps. So I switched to Openmediavault, which since then has served me very well.
With a plugin I could easily add my zfs raid and I use their build in docker compose gui to run the few programs I need.
I didn’t try out others, but there are more options. CasaOS and yunohost already got mentioned, there is also Cosmos or just running a basic server with e.g Debian and maybe adding Cockpit for some management gui.
I’m unclear on the benefit either has one just an NFS server.
Openmediavault only seems to run on Debian which is a no go for me. I’m looking for something immutable (ie an an appliance)
I guess if you want specific recommendations you need to define your needs and requirements a bit more.
Since I was wondering if Cockpit is an option for immutable distros I stumbled on this video, which seems to suggest it might since it is used on one there. So I guess you could pick your favorite immutable distros and see if Cockpit works to have a easy gui for managing the server stuff.
You could of course also go for something like NixOS and make everything declarative.
For me Openmediavault was easy to set up and just works for the little stuff I want it to do.
WARNING: I am not an expert!
Maybe VanillaOS? Immutable, atomic, Debian-based. If OpenMediaVault doesn’t run directly on Vanilla, use its APX tool to make a minimalist Debian container & install OpenMediaVault there?
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:
Fewer Letters More Letters Git Popular version control system, primarily for code NAS Network-Attached Storage NFS Network File System, a Unix-based file-sharing protocol known for performance and efficiency RAID Redundant Array of Independent Disks for mass storage SSH Secure Shell for remote terminal access ZFS Solaris/Linux filesystem focusing on data integrity
6 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 9 acronyms.
[Thread #200 for this comm, first seen 29th Mar 2026, 23:30] [FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]
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I’m running XigmaNAS
Yunohost seems the community pick these days. I also played around with CasaOS and found it very user friendly. Though development on that one seems to have stalled.
Those aren’t NASes if I’m not mistaken?
One option is to use a older version of TrueNAS until some alternatives start to show up.
I would probably keep my NAS offline so it does not phone home.
