EDIT: You don’t have to answer for my specific purposes, if you use a database for any purpose yourself then please share and tell what and why.
I’m not planning to host any fediverse or mastodon instances just yet, but maybe a private email server and porting a discord channel to matrix might be in my future.
What do you use and why? Is it limited to a specific OS, and if you were on a different OS then what would you be using instead? Do you think server hardware is required for most operability or can a good desktop computer and internet speed suffice as long as downtime isn’t a problem?
Is this for hosting at home with a home internet? Use a PC or even something like a raspberry pi. Just be frequent about backups if there is anything important on it. It might be easier to use a cheap VPS though, even if that doesn’t qualify as total self-hosting.
If the software you want to run recommends a particular database, use that. Otherwise, for small stuff, SQLite is good enough for most purposes, and less hassle than most alternatives.
You’re cool and I want you to appreciate yourself at least as much as I appreciate you right now.