Deep thought 💭 on Baïkal CalDav and CardDav and Dreamhost

I mentioned in my post Buying a product, not being one that I was running the CardDav / CalDav server Baïkal on Dreamhost (referral link), and I got an email from Chris asking:

I noticed on your blog you are running Baikal on Dreamhost. I was wondering if you could share any notes on how you got it running and sync’ing with iOS devices. I am trying to use the flat package I have have got in running and creating accounts but I am unable to login. Any assistance would be great.

These are those requested notes:

1. Download the “Flat package” from Baïkal.
2. Unzip and upload to Dreamhost. (This takes a while, go ahead and proceed to step 3)
3. Create a database from the Dreamhost Panel.
4. Point a web browser to yourdomain.hosted-at-dreamhost.com/admin
5. Set your timezone, set the password for the admin account, then click “Save Changes”
6. Check the “Use MySQL” checkbox.
7. Enter the MySQL database information for the database created in Step 3, the click “Save Changes”
8. Boom. You are done.

Now you have to create an account via the web interface.

In preparation of getting the contacts and calendars moved over, I exported all of the calendar and contact date before adding the Baïkal accounts, and then imported my data in.

To get your calendars / contacts on an iPhone or iPad, the instructions in INSTALL.md:

Apple Calendar:

From Preferences, add a new CalDAV account:

• username: the username you just created (in our example, jerome)
• password: the password you just defined
• In server address (replace domain and username): http:///yourdomain.hosted-at-dreamhost.com/cal.php/principals/jerome

Apple iPhone iCal:

• in Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendar > Add an account > Other
• Select “CalDAV”
• Server: http://yourdomain.hosted-at-dreamhost.com/cal.php/principals/jerome
• username: the username you just created (in our example, jerome)
• password: the password you just defined

Apple Address Book (OSX):

• username: the username you just created (in our example, jerome)
• password: the password you just defined
• In server address (replace domain and username): http://yourdomain.hosted-at-dreamhost.com/card.php/addressbooks/jerome/default

Apple Contacts (iOS):

• in Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendar > Add an account > Other
• Select “CardDAV”
• Server: yourdomain.hosted-at-dreamhost.com/card.php (note: no http:// nor https://, and no trailing slash)
• username: the username you just created (in our example, jerome)
• password: the password you just defined