RE: WG Last Call: draft-ietf-ldapbis-protocol-17.txt [corrected]

["Kurt D. Zeilenga" <Kurt@OpenLDAP.org>]

In the AttributeList case, I rather the ASN.1 be changed
to:
        AttributeList ::= SEQUENCE OF Attribute

where Attribute is as currently defined.

Kurt


At 05:07 PM 10/6/2003, Steven Legg wrote:

>Folks,
>
>I recently published an Internet draft on an XML rendition of the LDAP
>protocol (called XLDAP) that is realized by applying a set of XML
>encoding rules to the ASN.1 types in the ASN.1 specification for LDAP
>(specifically the ASN.1 in the protocols draft being last-called).
>
>The XML produced is neat and tidy except with respect to the instances
>of the member type of a SEQUENCE OF or SET OF ASN.1 type.
>
>Consider this example drawn from the protocols draft:
>
>        AttributeList ::= SEQUENCE OF SEQUENCE { 
>                type    AttributeDescription, 
>                vals    SET OF AttributeValue } 
>
>Using my Directory XML Encoding Rules (DXER) to encode an attribute list,
>each attribute in the list is encoded as an element with the safe, but
>bland name of <item>. Using the ITU-T's XML Encoding Rules (XER), each
>attribute in the list is encoded as an element with the unappealing name
>of <SEQUENCE>.
>    
>However the situation can be improved since the version of ASN.1 that
>the protocols draft is referencing allows an ASN.1 identifier after a
>SEQUENCE OF or SET OF and before the definition of the member type.
>
>For example:
>
>        AttributeList ::= SEQUENCE OF attribute SEQUENCE { 
>                type    AttributeDescription, 
>                vals    SET OF value AttributeValue } 
>
>With this change both DXER and XER would encode each attribute in the list
>as an element with the more meaningful name of <attribute>. This change
>makes no difference to the BER encoding, so it is neutral to LDAP and does
>not represent a new feature.
>
>I would like to see each of the SEQUENCE OF and SET OF definitions in the
>LDAP ASN.1 module given a meaningful mnemonic identifier for the member type
>so as to facilitate better XML representations of LDAP operations (whether
>for XLDAP or any other purpose). If the working group allows it I'll work
>with Jim to make the additions.
>
>Regards,
>Steven