| More than An
Addressbook
LDAP is the Lightweight Directory Access
Protocol. It is much more than an addressbook (Contact
Management). Today, LDAP is part of the standard
Internet protocols vital in the IT infrastructure. Directories
are used for authentication (Identity
Management), and
can be used for rapid object storage and retrieval of information
across your entire enterprise, or as "glue" to
allow the exchange of data between heterogeneous applications
using standard schemas.
LDAP was developed by the University
of Michigan and the Internet Engineering Task Force as a
set of network services to provide distributed object management
and access over TCP/IP networks. LDAP was, in turn, derived
from the older International Standards Organization X.500
Directory Access Protocol for OSI networks. SLAPD (pronounced
SLAP-"dee")
stands for the Standalone LDAP Daemon. aeSLAPD is a port
of SLAPD and the rest of the LDAP 3.3 UNIX software to scalable
Windows systems. Versions are available for many other hardware
platforms (Linux and UNIX). aeSLAPD is compatible with various
Open Source products and commercial offerings such as Sun/iPlanet
and Novell.
Why You Need It
- It's standard.
- It's everywhere.
- Finally. Everybody's on the same page
-- LDAP clients are a reality.
- NOW YOU NEED A SERVER
LDAP is the first application protocol
since the web HTTP to become a standard AND widely accepted
and used in major commercial products. Chances are, you're
already using LDAP. Almost all new browsers and mail products
rolling out today use LDAP as their shared addressbook.
With aeSLAPD you can create thousands of phone and address
entries and share them instantly with these client products:
- Every
Microsoft Internet Explorer since IE 4.0 (Browser and
Outlook Express E-mail)
- Netscape Communicator (Browser and E-mail)
- Microsoft Outlook
and OE
- QUALCOMM's Eudora and Eudora Pro 4.0 E-mail.
- Novell and many
more
Over 40
companies endorsed LDAP in 1996 as the directory
information standard for their products. The problem is
that these products contain LDAP client protocols. To use
them, and fully exploit the benefits of LDAP for your organization,
you need an LDAP server. If you have Internet connectivity,
you can access public LDAP servers like Four11, Bigfoot,
InfoSpace and others.
If you are a commercial, government or academic institution,
you need to be able to create your own shared addressbook
or phonebook. aeSLAPD is the perfect solution. aeSLAPD is
directly based on the University of Michigan's LDAP 3.3 SLAPD.
Instead of the unwieldy and complex UNIX implementation,
this version runs on any desktop Windows system (from Win95
to XP). It installs like any other Windows application and
allows easy edit and import of directory information using
your favorite text editor, or sophisticated browser-like
managers. |
