To add to this, it's reasonably easy to run, and has many different plugins, from a calendar and contacts list, to an online document editor (like Google Docs, except it can be pretty slow and/or resource intensive: https://nextcloud.com/office/), to a simple clone of Slack (https://nextcloud.com/talk/), a mail client (https://apps.nextcloud.com/apps/mail) and other things.

That said, I've had updates (across major versions) break things on multiple occasions, one out of two servers running the exact same version has random crashes and in addition to that the file locking by default (if enabled, but not using Redis: https://docs.nextcloud.com/server/latest/admin_manual/config...) has broken and prevents me from deleting a file that just sits there and takes up a few GB of space. Oh and their Android app fails to upload files if I use the share option, instead of the file picker from within the app.

On the other hand, sure beats storing data on third party clouds and is free, so I'll still keep using it.

> you just share the folder

And this is how some company can accidentally see way more than it had should.

Never do this for anything remotely important, just add a separate 'Share' folder and allow sharing to external users only from it.

Don't forget, if the user can't see something on the server that doesn't mean there is nothing else there. Eg: ABE enabled SMB share.

Note: your customers do not require an account in your Nextcloud. You can share by link, and optionally add a password too.

And as a bonus it can also be set as a drop box, where customers can send files to a folder of your choice. All the benefits of wetransfer but self hosted.

I know, but even sending a link is not that straightforward in my experience.

O.o how is that not straightforward? Sending a link is the easiest thing in the world.

Yes, sending it is easy. But on the other side, whatever software my customers are using tends to break the links.

I've had that with both mail clients and messenger. Call it antivirus protections, "you're leaving our website" thing, facebook tracking data... Whatever, they will break your links eventually.

I know, it's unbelievable, I don't blame you for doubting me. But still...