Appendix E: Configuration of OpenLDAP

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Overview

In this book, I used OpenLDAP for many examples. This part of the book should give you some hints for its configuration. It assumes you have configured and tested OpenLDAP correctly, therefore I assume you have a running OpenLDAP server in your architecture. At this point you are ready to configure the OpenLDAP server to fit best your needs. This section is intended to help you with this configuration; however, it should not substitute for the excellent "Administrator's Guide," which is shipped together with the OpenLDAP source code, nor should you ignore the documentation available at the OpenLDAP Web site (http://www.openldap.org).

Nearly every LDAP-related tool installed on your computer uses the configuration file. When you install your LDAP distribution servers, command line tools, utilities, main pages, and configuration files are installed at the location you designate during compilation; if you do not specify anything else, the software defaults to the configuration file at this location.

Be sure to use the software you installed. Many operating systems (e.g., I am using Sun Solaris 2.9) contain LDAP clients, or perhaps you have a resident LDAP installation with tools such as slapcat or slapadd. A common mistake is to use them instead of the freshly compiled ones, and therefore you may use a different configuration file. In UNIX, the command "which slapcat" will tell you the path of the configuration file you are using.

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