Selfhosted

Mine are all named for the colour of the case, or case accent when ambiguous, though network infrastructure items are named for their models, being the typical default.

I sometimes use A records or mDNS-SD for the actual services provided and use a *.home.arpa. domain.

Another theme at another site is native fauna and flora names.

No cringe, no pop culture.

I use "butler" terms, like:

• Jarvis
• Archibald - used for my old Arch desktop
• Alfred

They serve me well, and I give them due respect.

Usually, some type of pun based on the hardware.

My devices are named after planets from Doctor Who: mondas, telos, skaro, villengard.

I use characters from whichever book I'm reading at the time. Examples:

• Arya: From ASOIAF, a small but powerful Ultrabook
• Cthulhu: From HP Lovecraft, a huge 17" laptop
• Horus: From the Horus Heresy books, A powerful laptop
• Binky: Death's white horse from discworld, a white desktop
• Peaches: A rat that always carries a book with her. My home server

They're all some kind of machine. Steam deck: SteamMachineryV1

PC: ArchMachineryV2

Phone: Android_μMachine

Oddly enough my server goes by MonoVerse, which I named first and I guess it just stuck.

Solar System objects for my local network and names of extra solar objects for my offside servers. With all the moons and named trans neptunian objects in the solar system I so far had no issues finding a hostname candidate.

Internal server (Home Assistant etc.): domus
External server (Nextcloud etc.): nimbus
Router/firewall: murus

Hardware hosts usually get a mix of hardware description and main use, e.g. en old Esprimo with Proxmox is esprimox. Virtual hosts are garden themed - auth server is mycel, monitoring will be called canopy once I move it, VM with lots of docker stuff is garden etc.

I name based on OS and location.

fedoraDesktop fedoraLaptop fedoraServer fedoraSchoolServer unraid qnap ubuntuServer

My media server is called "The_Nexus."

My phone when I host anything on it is "The Hackinator 9000" because I think it would be funny for a normie to see and freak out.

I gave up on cute or clever names a while ago; now I go with “storage0”, “router0”, “wap00”, “vmhost0”. Always with a numeric suffix because there will be a -1, -2 some day.

All of my infrastructure is named after terminator.

Used to be astronomy based. Sol for actual network and then planets and stellar bodies and stuff. But I have so many devices now.

Now I just make it ass informative with as free letters as possible. Almost everything is 3 or 4 letters long.

So like fsrv for file server, msvr for media server and so on.

Current homelab+desktop+laptop host count here is 22. All anime characters or references. It’s a fairly large pool to pull from, so it’s worked for me for 20+ years now. Mobile devices (phones, tablets, etc) and game consoles aren’t really as clever though.

All of them are in a piHole DNS though so no host files keeps it easy to track. Services have names that mostly are just what they are though and cnames to the matching host that hosts them (or load balancer, whatever)

They're all some kind of machine. Steam deck: SteamMachineryV1

PC: ArchMachineryV2

Phone: Android_μMachine

Oddly enough my server goes by MonoVerse, which I named first and I guess it just stuck.

im very lazy now but i used to use tyrande, shandris, and then rotate around any other kalimidor/kaldorei places and people because when i played warcraft i was obsessed with night elves

I use characters from Haikyu and Thor.

I have asahi, hinata, daichi and heimdal running.

'fuck' and the family of 'fucking'

ok so don't hate me but h001, h002, h003, and so on.

That's h for host. I also use n to number networks, and k to number physical keys.

I list them all in my keepassxc password database, where I can include any additional information.

With the prevalence of vms, docker containers, and docker networks, there's just too many things to name. By numbering them I can just side step that whole game.

I use names of bones for my different serves. I have metacarpus, clavicle, femur and coccyx.

@Krik For my personal devices, i use the names of the 12 Colonies of Kobol from Battlestar Galactica. So I currently have 2 laptops: Aerilon and Caprica. When I get a new phone, I'll probably name it Scorpia or Tauron.

Choosing a good naming scheme depends on how many you need, and how often you add to your collection.

If you need some inspiration, check out this list. https://namingschemes.com/Main/_Page

Every computer I own is an autobot. My primary machine is always Optimus Prime, has been since 2008. Other machines get other names generally slightly inspired by their role / nature. Bumblebee and CliffJumper are miniPCs of various persuasions, Preceptor is my "mess around with AI" box, my big server that handles most of my data and network services is Wheeljack, my Macbook is Mirage, my backup server is Powerglide, my TV (which is an old Dell all in One running Linux Mint) is UltraMagnus.

Desktop: 30p87
Laptop: 30p87-laptop
Phone: 30p87-phone
Server: 30p87-server
DNS server at location bv: 30p87-dns-bv
DNS server at location db: 30p87-dns-db
Switch at location bv: 30p87-bottom-bv
Switch at location db: 30p87-bottom-db

Depends on how many hostnames I need. If I just need 2, using opposite duals is fun, {romeo,ruliet}.shakespeare.com. 4 I almost always use cardinal directions or the seasons; {north,south,east,west}.domain.com or {spring,summer,fall,winter}.domain.com.

If I need a lot of potential subdomains, you can't beat the Greek or NATO alphabet, giving you 24 and 26 hostnames respectively which can be further enhanced by using the purpose of the server with the alphabet;

• beta-w02.domain.com # second webserver on beta
• beta-db02.domain.com # second db on beta

I named mine after different Half Life characters: GMAN- Server FREEMAN- Main Gaming Rig ALYX- Laptop

And so on...

I usually use pokémon, typically from the first few generations.

I don't have a whole network setup like the rest of you guys, but I've been naming my desktop pc's SHODAN ever since I built my first one. Secondary/partner's pc is named XERXES. I'll probably never change them.

Reserved for future use: krex & krox

Poor "kryx".

I named my old white bitfenix prodigy m "Baymax" because it was white and had rounded edges.

I've gone through lots of themes. These days it's mostly where things are or what they are for. Topshelf, closet, code lives on monkey, work laptop is named work. I've had more fun themes but the novelty wore off.

Naming my devices after stars. Specifically stars in Ursa-Major

Desktop: alioth Laptop: alkaid Smartphone: alcor SteamDeck: dubhe Server: sarir

I call them after what service is running on it. E.g. openvpn.