You are talking about a manual watchdog timer system. There are low cost and free systems to do things like this - a search for network and application monitors will turn them up.

Its way better to try to address why the core program dies that patch around it this way but as that’s not always easy (or cost effective if the code is out of maintenance) then just create a small program that checks if the core app is running and restart it if its not. This can be run from the system scheduler every few minutes.

If you have no way to tell the program has died (other than users shouting) then you could look to send an email to a mailbox that’s monitored by a background program and restart when it gets one.

Another way is to create a simple web page that is hosted on a box and use that to trigger the reset.

Which ntfs software are you using?

IIRC there are three options now (inc one in the kernel that’s supposed to be a bit rough still) but the most stable seems to be the older fuse option of ntfs-3g.

I moved to getting none Linux boxes reading Ext4 drives using https://www.paragon-software.com/ drivers.

Have you tried using wsl mount on Windows to access Ext drives (may depend on your Windows version)…

Bit baffled by u/ajnozari comment on share security issues - SMB via SAMBA is well documented as to how to set things up…

I’ve had minor issues swapping cd drives over due to the mounting in a couple of units (HP or IBM IIRC).

The drives came on a slide tray that clipped in rather than have standard mounts or holes. Did not take long to add holes and use a converter tray that fits into a normal 5 1/4 inch drive bays and mounts 3.5" or 2.5" drives.

I did see one Wyse sff machine that had a laptop cd in it - no way could I fit anything in that :-)

If power / noise is a concern then look at the small form factor PC options on eBay.

Some of these will take two or three drives if you remove the CD / DVD drive and can handle a fair number of tasks if memory is increased.

I’ve been using my old Mac mini (late 2012) under Debian and Docker - maxed it out to two drives and 16GB - these pop up for £40 - £50 now and then and about take as much power in idle as my Pi boards but way more CPU abilities when running.

Not cheap but excellent quality https://lincolnbinns.com/shop/internet-of-things-iot/raspberry-pi-enclosures.html

I used them for a pair of bespoke Pi 4B 10" rack mounts and was very happy with everything from the project management to delivery time. The face plate cutting and coating was excellent - no rough edges or smudge ‘paint’ in site.

The HAT may cause an issue for their standard enclosure (it’s a total wrap around providing cooling) but drop them an email and see if they can help.