Preface
The Red Hat Directory Server Deployment Guide provides a solid foundation on the concepts and configuration options for planning an effective directory service. The information provided here is intended for both designers and administrators.
1. Directory Server Overview
Red Hat Directory Server provides the following key features:
- Multi-supplier replication — Provides a highly available directory service for both read and write operations. Multi-supplier replication can be combined with simple and cascading replication scenarios to provide a highly flexible and scalable replication environment.
- Chaining and referrals — Increases the power of the directory by storing a complete logical view of the directory on a single server while maintaining data on a large number of Directory Servers transparently for clients.
- Roles and classes of service — Provides a flexible mechanism for grouping and sharing attributes between entries dynamically.
- Efficient access control mechanisms — Provides support for macros that dramatically reduce the number of access control statements used in the directory and increase the scalability of access control evaluation.
- Resource-limits by bind DN — Grants the power to control the amount of server resources allocated to search operations based on the bind DN of the client.
- Multiple databases — Provides a simple way of breaking down the directory data to simplify the implementation of replication and chaining in the directory service.
- Password policy and account lockout — Defines a set of rules that govern how passwords and user accounts are managed in the Directory Server.
- TLS provides secure authentication and communication over the network, using the Mozilla Network Security Services (NSS) libraries for cryptography.
The major components of Directory Server include the following:
- An LDAP server — The LDAP v3-compliant network daemon.
- A web console — A graphical management console that reduces the effort of setting up and maintaining the directory service.
- SNMP agent — Can monitor the Directory Server using the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP).