Just came across this thing called the “Amahi Home Linux Server”, something they refer to as a HDA or Home Digital Assistant. Looks like a pretty nice idea. I haven’t tried it yet – I just found it and don’t really have a spare machine that would be appropriate right now. But what interests me is that it’s very much like something I was working on about 10 years ago that I called “Home AIWeb”.
Basically it’s a home-centric application server. Sounds like out of the box it supports media serving, calendaring, backup, and VPN. Administration is through a web interface. One idea I had that I’d like to see if Amahi is going with is some standardization of application data and a common database. So for example you would have a common set of contact data that could be used by any application you installed. Calendar, address book, financial, etc. I wonder how insulated the applications and plugins are under Amahi.
When I get the chance, I’ll set this thing up and see how it goes. Stay tuned!