How do I learn about my Nextcloud server?

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The history command allows you to confirm as opposed to assume. Since that was your response I do not think you are ready for this task.

A young man asks a roofer how to thatch his roof. The old roofer asks the young man if you owns a ladder.

My concern is you not having experience with the terminal / linux to manage this. Or, have not tried to search the internet / watch videos online / read documentation / actually jumped into the terminal to learn how these work. So, I would agree with everything devnull wrote above.

Maintenance requires you have the tools / underlying knowledge / ability to search the internet to handle this. It will take time to understand through hands-on experience. Whether that journey is worthwhile is up to you. Thankfully, you do not have to understand all of this by the power of managed hosting, but if you do proceed the burden of figuring this out will entirely ride on your own shoulders; we can offer some pointers as volunteers, but will not be able to do the work for you.

How was your server originally setup?

Did you pay someone to do it for you? Or, was it done by a friend? Is it running on a pi or old laptop / tower? Are you running your server from your desktop?

Curious on that, and I do think it is cool that this interests you. It is a rabbit hole, but thankfully you can search the forum and internet to learn everything there is no know on Nextcloud, how to manage your Ubuntu server, and Linux itself.

My suggestion: Make a full backup on a separate disk of all your data if you do not have one.

edit: I’ll add responses to your questions above:

Start by understanding how to SSH (remotely connect) into your server. Then you can start poking around using terminal tools once you are sure you have a backup.

That is a massive topic. You’d need to reference the documentation for Docker or the many iterations of virtual machines to understand them. Hopefully this is not how this is setup for your sanity. Could also be installed as a Snap or bare metal (normal), or…

Check the Ubuntu documentation. Ubuntu is built upon Debian, so if Debian works you’ll find Ubuntu following along.

That is up to you. LTS releases (20.04 and 22.04) do not require a major upgrade for four years.

You’ll need to have backups, but also learn how to use them you need to restore or migrate your data.
It would also be worth using a test system, such as a VPS or spare computer, to test things and refine your process before making changes to your production system.

Search the forum
admin documentation for Nextcloud, Ubuntu, whatever else.
search the internet
watch youtube videos
man history
history --help
understanding linux permissions

This will get you started. Good luck.

#2 Tip: Keep detailed Notes

You’ll need to begin taking detailed notes using something like the Nextcloud Notes app and markdown. Be super detailed so you can pick up where you leave off. Example:

Here is my example of how to take good notes. Hope it helps.

I asked the forum and they offered various suggestions on how to maintain my server.

  • Searched duckduckgo on understanding permissions
  • Need to read Nextcloud admin documentation and search the forum to understand more.
  • Unable to SSH into my server. Will look into how to fix this.
### Understanding my Nextcloud server.
I asked [the forum](https://help.nextcloud.com/t/how-do-i-learn-about-my-nextcloud-server/153979/8?u=just) and they offered various suggestions on how to maintain my server.
- [Searched duckduckgo](https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=understanding+linux+permissions&ia=web) on understanding permissions
  - [read this article.](https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/permissions-in-linux/)
- Need to read Nextcloud admin documentation and search the forum to understand more.
- Unable to SSH into my server.  Will look into how to fix this.
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