[Charlug] January Meeting

[Don Parris]

On Dec 27, 2007 5:16 PM, Rick Pasotto <rick at niof.net> wrote:

> On Thu, Dec 27, 2007 at 05:01:39PM -0500, Don Parris wrote:
> >
> > As for our topic, I thought I would ride on the coattails of Carla
> > Schroder's new book, 'The Linux Networking Cookbook', and talk a little
> > about OpenLDAP.  This discussion will be aimed at getting up and running
> > with OpenLDAP at a basic level.
> >
> > I will cover:
> > Installing (with some notes on the differences between Debian & Fedora)
> > Organizing the Structure
> > Creating and Modifying Records
> > Using the Database
> > Basic Access Control
>
> For those of us who have only *heard* of LDAP maybe you could start with
> what it is, where and how and why it is used, competing technologies, etc.
>
>
> Fair enough!  I'll start here, but will discuss in the meeting as well.

LDAP is the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol, essentially a directory
service that offers centralized storage of information about the users and
devices in your network.  It can be used in conjunction with NFS (the
Network File System), in similar fashion to Microsoft's Active Directory
service.  It can provide single-sign-on services or be used simply as a
glorified address book.

Actually, Microsoft's Active Directory is a non-Free implementation of the
LDAP protocol.  Open LDAP is a Free/Open implementation.  An older directory
service, Sun's Network Information System (NIS) is similar, although
probably not as advanced as LDAP.  My imperfect understand is that LDAP
typically offers better access control than NIS, but I seem to recall some
more experienced admins suggesting that normal security procedures will keep
the latter adequately secure.

I have managed to get my OpenLDAP server working so that I can connect
locally, remotely and via a GUI tool (GQ), as well as using KAddressBook's
LDAP search tool to find contact information.  LDAP is something I have long
been interested in learning about, but have always felt stymied by the mass
of information until I read the Linux Networking Cookbook.

Cheers,
Don
-- =

D.C. Parris
Minister, Journalist, Free Software Advocate
https://www.xing.com/profile/Don_Parris
http://www.linkedin.com/in/dcparris
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