Christian Mangold :: neversfelde

You should read part 1 before. After installing the necessary software, next step is the configuration of Kontact and Akonadi. It is not too complicated, but needs probably some experimentation. If you make mistakes, you probably want to delete the whole configuration to make a new start. It is necessary to remove all Akonadi files in your ~ directory. They are placed at several locations:

• ~/.config/akonadi
• ~/.kde/share/config/akonadi-firstrunrc
• ~/.kde/share/config/akonadi_gcal_resource_0rc
• ~/.kde/share/config/akonadi_googledata_resource_0rc
• ~/.kde/share/config/akonadi_ical_resource_1rc
• ~/.local/share/akonadi

It should be self-evident that you backup your data before you change your configuration. Again I have to say, that this procedure is more a proof of concept than a solution for productive environments.

Akonadi:

We’ll start with Akonadi itself, settings can be found in “Systemsettings >> Advanced >> Akonadi Configuration”. First make sure that the Akonadi server is running, you can check this by activating the “Akonadi Server Configuration” tab and having a look at the section “Status”. If the server is stopped, start it. You should also check if it is started automatically after next KDE reboot. I read about some problems with Akonadi not starting, but I could not reproduce it myself.

Altogether I’m using four different resources for Akonadi, two for contacts and two for the calendar. If have some contacts and appointments that have to stay private and I do not want to send them to my Google account. I store this private data local only. You can add these resources by adding “ICal Calendar File” and “VCard File”. Kontact stores the contacts in ~/.kde/share/apps/kabc/std.vcf and the calendar file is ~/.kde/share/apps/korganizer/std.ics. Of course you can also use different locations.

The more important resources are the Google ones. They are called “Akonadi Google Calendar Resource” and “Akonadi Google Contacts Resource”. After adding them, you will be asked after your Google username and password. Username is the first part of your gmail address, @gmail.com is added automatically. After adding these two resources Akonadi is ready. Unfortunately I ran into some problems with the Akonadi Google resource, I am sure you will notice these problems, too.  I am also sure that it will be better in the next versions, so please report or confirm bugs.

Kontact:

Last step for this part of the howto is the configuration of Kontact. It is not very difficult, all you have to do is to add the newly configured Akonadi resources to the used adressbooks and calendars. If you like, you can also make the Google calendar default. If you do not, you will be asked whether you want to store tho contact or appointment in the local files or in the Google resource. I think a screenshot is best to explain this step:

Make sure that you add the Akonadi resources for kaddressbook and korganizer.

You will notice that todos are not synced. As I mentioned before, I do this via Rememberthemilk and Astrid, but this has to wait untill I get part 3 ready. Stay tuned.