LDAP client question

[Jordan Erickson]

Scott Balneaves wrote:
> On Wed, Jan 20, 2010 at 09:03:43AM -0800, Jordan Erickson wrote:
>> David Hopkins wrote:
>> *snip*
>>> As for questions to the server team ... which
>>> list would that be?
>> /me thinks the server team would probably get a lot of good ideas from
>> the LTSP+Edubuntu communities...
> 
> Been there, done that, diiiiiiiiidn't get a whole lot of response.

Marketing law states that you must expose XYZ to a potential at *least*
3 times before they will even read it.. I propose we attempt to build an
inter-community relationship with the server community.. It couldn't
hurt to try, and we have nothing but good people/ideas to gain..

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam/GettingInvolved


> If I might proffer an opinion....
> 
> LDAP's a "hard" subject.  It's:
> 
> 1) Non-trivial to set up
> 2) Infinitely customizable
> 3) Lacking any discernable standard as to how you should lay out your database
>    for authentication.
> 
> So the problem is, every time you poke your head up and say: "Hey guys, lets do
> X!" you're greeted by a chorus of "Yeah, but what about....", an which point
> everybody stares at their shoes, goes "Hmmmm, interesting problem <deep
> thought>" and the problem disappears off into the sunset for another few
> months.
> 
> I'm not blaming them.  LDAP *is* the single largest PITA to configure/setup/get
> working, and it's deucedly difficult to try to make the "perfect" tool.
> 
> Both RedHat and SkoleLinux solved the problem by saying "You'll do it our way
> and *like it*!!!!", with the end result that they have something that works,
> but God help you if you want/need to do something different.  Debian, and by
> extention Ubuntu, is still waiting for the perfect, infinitely customizable yet
> easy-to-use LDAP tool to come along.

IMVHO, There is no such thing. Having a rock-solid, infinitively
customizable, yet easy to set up+configure XYZ is a paradoxical dream.
What we might be able to discuss is a generic "school type auth" LDAP
setup, which as you said, even Redhat seems to have to do... If you
want/need customization, you can learn the shell tools. It's not
confining this way, because you have an absolute choice of either one.
We'd just be making it a bit easier for people who don't need elaborate
setups.



Cheers,
Jordan