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LinkJar PDS

Create the first account

Sign-up needs an invite code, so that strangers cannot fill the server. The admin password creates codes.

Create an invite code

Section titled “Create an invite code”

On the host, with PDS_ADMIN_PASSWORD from pds.env in the environment:

Terminal window
curl -s -u "admin:$PDS_ADMIN_PASSWORD" -H 'content-type: application/json' -d '{"useCount": 1}' https://pds.example.com/xrpc/com.atproto.server.createInviteCode

It answers {"code":"pds-example-com-xxxxx-xxxxx"}. A code with a useCount of 5 admits five accounts.

Sign up from the Bluesky app

Section titled “Sign up from the Bluesky app”
  1. Open the app and choose Create account.
  2. Under Hosting provider, choose Custom and enter https://pds.example.com.
  3. Enter the invite code, an email address, a password and a handle. The handle becomes alice.pds.example.com.
  4. Post something.

The first request for alice.pds.example.com makes Caddy fetch its certificate, which takes a few seconds.

Or sign up from the terminal

Section titled “Or sign up from the terminal”
Terminal window
curl -s -H 'content-type: application/json' -d '{"email":"alice@example.com","handle":"alice.pds.example.com","password":"…","inviteCode":"pds-example-com-xxxxx-xxxxx"}' https://pds.example.com/xrpc/com.atproto.server.createAccount

The answer holds the account’s did, its handle and a session. Sign in with the handle and the password from any app.

Check the handle

Section titled “Check the handle”
Terminal window
curl -s https://alice.pds.example.com/.well-known/atproto-did

It prints the account’s DID, did:plc:…. Apps resolve handles this way.

When posts reach other people

Section titled “When posts reach other people”

A post appears in other people’s timelines once the relay at bsky.network crawls the host. The server asks it to with the first write after a start, and then at most once in twenty minutes. The relay’s own status shows the connection:

Terminal window
curl -s "https://bsky.network/xrpc/com.atproto.sync.getHostStatus?hostname=pds.example.com"

The answer has "status":"active" and a seq that moves with each write.

Next: set up email so that confirmation and password-reset mail arrives, and back up the data directory and pds.env.