Everything so far was built to scratch my own itch so now I want to build the roadmap based on what others need or want. CalDav definitely sounds sensible, OIDC is also on the roadmap as well as API token support. In a couple of days I plan to post a more structured roadmap and publish it on github.
Depends on your use-case. If you only want to store your contacts go for Thunderbird contacts or Baikal. Meerkat helps you when you want a more user-friendly way to organize everything around those contacts, like relationships between them, a timeline of activities and scheduling for reminders. I also started with a spreadsheet but at some point required something more sophisticated.
Thank you! If anything is unclear or missing feel free to message me or open a github issue. As the maintainer I sometimes can’t see the forest for the trees anymore :)
There is an export button in the settings to export all data (aside from profile pictures) as CSV or export the contacts as VCF including profile pictures (but excluding activities and notes). Both of these methods allow for import into e.g. google contacts if you want to migrate away. In general all data is stored in an sqlite database on your file system as well as a folder for the profile photos.
//Edit: To migrate data into meerkat there is also an import assistant in the contact list page that allows for VCF or CSV import
There’s quite an overlap in functionality but differences in how it works in detail. Looking for example at reminders, Meerkat shows overdue reminders in the dashboard until you acknowledge them (email reminder goes out only once of course). Then the reminder can be marked done and get persisted into the timeline or you can skip it. You can also set reminders to reschedule from completion date (e.g. you have a weekly catchup, are behind for five days; then the reminder is rescheduled for in a week not for in two days). Or looking at profile photos you can also just copy the image address from e.g. a LinkedIn profile in pull it in via the dialogue without saving it locally on disk. There are many such differences, so best see what works better for you.
Thank you and do open a github issue if anything is not working as expected or the docs are unclear. I used expose in the docker compose file to help other developers understand the application better (expose itself is only for documentation, only ‘ports’ actually opens a port outside the internal network). Both containers also sit behind an nginx that acts as a single entry point. The /health endpoint exists currently only for docker healthcheck but I like your idea of exposing it through the frontend to allow for Uptime Kuma monitoring. I’ll implement that next.
Currently it uses Resend (https://resend.com/) for email sending. You can add your resend token as env variable. The free plan allows for 3.000 mails per month, Meerkat would send you one mail a day at the specified time.