RE: Unique identifiers for LDAP attributes

["David Chadwick" <d.w.chadwick@salford.ac.uk>]

Date forwarded: 	Thu, 13 Jul 2000 21:42:39 -0700 (PDT)
From:           	"Ramsay, Ron" <Ron.Ramsay@ca.com>
To:             	d.w.chadwick@salford.ac.uk, ietf-ldapext@netscape.com
Subject:        	RE: Unique identifiers for LDAP attributes
Date sent:      	Fri, 14 Jul 2000 14:42:36 +1000
Forwarded by:   	ietf-ldapext@netscape.com

> David,
> 
> I agree with the philosophy. However, there may be a middle course.

true

> Where the attribute has been standardised by appearing in an IETF
> standard,

or other recognised standard (e.g. ITU-T or EN etc)

> the name used in the standard could be considered
> standardised. For all other attributes, an OID is required. There may
> be other publication methods which can standardise attribute names, eg
> informational RFCs.

not informational, I think they would need to be standards track, but 
minor point

David

> 
> Ron.
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Chadwick [mailto:d.w.chadwick@salford.ac.uk]
> Sent: Friday, 14 July 2000 0:03
> To: ietf-ldapext@netscape.com
> Subject: 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
> 
> ***************************************************
> 
> 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
> Entrust key validation string MLJ9-DU5T-HV8J
> 
> ***************************************************
> 
> 


***************************************************

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
Entrust key validation string MLJ9-DU5T-HV8J

***************************************************