Often proving access to multiple systems and services in a corporate or enterprise can cause multiple usernames and passwords to be created for each individual system. This can lead to chaos and human intervention for updating or removing the privileges.

LDAP uses a central directory access protocol which can solve such administration issues by collecting and storing information about people on a server which can be accessed via several applications. All the information is stored in “Directories” with each individual entry being saved as an object. Thus each object has a object id (OID) or unique object identifier and attributes and value pair.

Since , all the values are encapsulated in an object, thus accessing and searching for any value is as simple as running a query on that specific attribute. For e.g. to search for Smith across all the users, the “name” attribute can be searched for the string “Smith”.

Directory Structure

LDAP not only provides querying the directory but also updating the table for any changes. Thus, adding to removing access levels can be done simply by running a query.

There are various books which can help to get an in-depth knowledge and understanding of LDAP and  IBM Red Book on LDAP is a great source to start. Do let us know any other sources worth reading for newbie’s to LDAP.

LDAP Resources:

Article: Leveraging LDAP

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