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A Simple Pi-hole Dashboard – Built by a Fellow Enthusiast

Okay, so you know I’m a bit of a self-hosting geek. I tinker with servers, I run a bunch of little services, and I’m always looking for ways to make things a little easier to manage. Recently, I stumbled across something that reminded me of those little projects you do when you just want to understand how things work and maybe build something useful along the way.

It started with a Reddit post from a user named Bhooteshwara (you can check it out here: [link]). He’d created a really neat dashboard for Pi-hole, and it got me thinking. I figured, “Hey, I could probably do something similar.” And I did!

The Idea Behind Pi-Dash

Pi-Dash is a Progressive Web App (PWA) dashboard for your Pi-hole instances. Basically, it gives you a clean, at-a-glance view of how your Pi-hole is doing. I wasn’t trying to reinvent the wheel, really. It’s just a simple way to monitor key stats without having to wade through a lot of logs.

Pi-hole itself is fantastic – it’s a DNS server that blocks ads and trackers. But sometimes, you want to quickly check if it’s still working as expected, or see if it’s blocking any particular domains. Pi-Dash provides that information right on your device, without needing a complex web interface.

How it Works (and Why it’s Cool)

The core of Pi-Dash is a small JavaScript application that connects to your Pi-hole instances via their APIs. The APIs provide data on things like:

• Blocked domains
• Requests per hour
• Successful vs. unsuccessful requests
• DNS query statistics

It then presents this data in a responsive way, so it looks good on both my phone and my laptop. The beauty of a PWA is that you can install it on your home screen, like an app, and it works offline too!

My Story with Pi-Dash

I built this primarily because I wanted a way to monitor my Pi-hole on my old Android device. I have a bunch of older devices lying around, and I often find myself wanting to check on things while I’m, you know, just relaxing. It felt like a good project to get me thinking about the power of simple automation and monitoring. I was really impressed by the community’s response on Reddit – people were praising the design and functionality. Even better, a few folks created a Docker version, and another person built a web interface on top of the API!

Where to Find Pi-Dash

You can find the source code on GitHub. It’s open source, so feel free to fork it, modify it, or contribute to the project! It’s a great example of how a small project can gain traction and benefit from community collaboration.

It’s Not About Being a Genius

Honestly, the biggest takeaway from this project wasn’t the dashboard itself, but the reminder that you don’t need to build something complicated to be useful. Sometimes, the best solutions are the simplest ones. And who knows – maybe you’ll find a use for it too!

Let me know in the comments if you’ve tried it out, or if you’ve built something similar!