Directory Service Content

A directory service stores information such as user names, passwords, and group membership. To access the information in a directory service, you must know the distinguished name that references the storage location of the information. For sign-in applications, the distinguished name is a combination of variable information (such as a user name) and fixed information (such as the storage location of user names). The elements that make up a distinguished name depend on the structure and content of the directory service.

The following examples show possible definitions for a group of users called USERS-NNMi-Admin. This group lists the directory service user IDs that have administrative access to NNMi. The following information pertains to these examples:

• The Active Directory example is for the Windows operating system.
• The other directory services example is for Linux operating systems.
• The file shown in each example is a portion of a lightweight directory interchange format (LDIF) file. LDIF files provide for sharing directory service information.
• The figure shown in each example is a graphical representation of the directory service domain that provides an expanded view of the information in the LDIF file excerpt.

Example content structure for Active Directory

In this example, the following items are of interest:

• The distinguished name of the user John Doe is:
  CN=john.doe@example.com,OU=Users,OU=Accounts,DC=example,DC=com
• The distinguished name of the group USERS-NNMi-Admin is:
  CN=USERS-NNMi-Admin,OU=Groups,OU=Accounts,DC=example,DC=com
• The group attribute that stores the directory service user ID is:
  member

Example LDIF file excerpt:

groups |USERS-NNMi-Admin
dn: CN=USERS-NNMi-Admin,OU=Groups,OU=Accounts,DC=example,DC=com
cn: USERS-NNMi-Admin
description: Group of users for NNMi administration.
member: CN=john.doe@example.com,OU=Users,OU=Accounts,
 DC=example,DC=com
member: CN=chris.smith@example.com,OU=Users,OU=Accounts,
  DC=example,DC=com

The following diagram illustrates this directory service domain.

Example Domain for Active Directory

Example content structure for other directory services

In this example, the following items are of interest:

• The distinguished name of the user John Doe is:
  uid=john.doe@example.com,ou=People,o=example.com
• The distinguished name of the group USERS-NNMi-Admin is:
  cn=USERS-NNMi-Admin,ou=Groups,o=example.com
• The group attribute that stores the directory service user ID is:
  member

Example LDIF file excerpt:

groups |USERS-NNMi-Admin
dn: cn=USERS-NNMi-Admin,ou=Groups,o=example.com
cn: USERS-NNMi-Admin
description: Group of users for NNMi administration.
member: uid=john.doe@example.com,ou=People,o=example.com
member: uid=chris.smith@example.com,ou=People,o=example.com

Example Domain for Other Directory Services