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Unique identifiers for LDAP attributes
Folks
I was at a Middleware meeting a few weeks ago where some guys
from Internet 2 were talking about outstanding problems with LDAP.
One of the points raised was the lack of a unique name for attribute
types, and that two LDAP servers could have the same name for
different attributes or different names for the same attribute. They
were wanting to create a group that could standardise on the
names of LDAP attribute types. When I pointed out to them that we
already have unique identifiers for each attribute type in the shape
of OIDs, that do not have the multilingual and character set
problems that strings have, they seemed convinced that this could
work.
However, we have the situation that some LDAP servers do not
require OIDs to be defined for attribute types, and the LDAP spec
deprecates the use of OIDs in protocol in preference to strings.
Given that many LDAP clients now map the attribute type strings
from protocol into a user friendly language dependent display string,
the string representation in protocol has about had its day and
served its purpose. Isnt it about time that we altered the LDAP
spec to recommend that OIDs be the preferred way of transferring
attribute types in protocol, and that the OIDs become the globally
unique way of identifying attribute types.
(Firewalls up to protect from flames)
David
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David Chadwick
IS Institute, University of Salford, Salford M5 4WT
Tel +44 161 295 5351 Fax +44 161 745 8169
Mobile +44 790 167 0359
Email D.W.Chadwick@salford.ac.uk
Home Page http://www.salford.ac.uk/its024/chadwick.htm
Understanding X.500 http://www.salford.ac.uk/its024/X500.htm
X.500/LDAP Seminars http://www.salford.ac.uk/its024/seminars.htm
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