Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) is used to access directory listings. A directory listing, or service, provides a directory of names, profile information, and machine addresses for every user and resource on the network. It can be used to manage user accounts and network permissions.
LDAP servers are typically hierarchical in design and provide fast lookups of resources. LDAP can be used as a replacement to the traditional Sybase interfaces file (sql.ini on Windows) to store and retrieve information about Sybase servers.
Any type of LDAP service, whether it is an actual server or a gateway to other LDAP services, is called an LDAP server. An LDAP driver calls LDAP client libraries to establish connections to an LDAP server. The LDAP driver and client libraries define the communication protocol, such as whether encryption is enabled, and the contents of messages exchanged between clients and servers. Messages are operators, such as client requests for read, write, and queries, and server responses, including data-format information.
When the LDAP driver connects to the LDAP server, the server establishes the connection based on two authentication methods—anonymous access, and user name and password authentication.
Anonymous access – does not require any authentication information; therefore, you do not have to set any properties. Anonymous access is typically used for read-only privileges.
User name and password – can be specified in the libtcl.cfg file (libtcl64.cfg file for 64-bit platforms) as an extension to the LDAP URL or set with property calls to Client-Library. The user name and password that are passed to the LDAP server through Ct-Lib are separate and distinct from the user name and password used to log in to Adaptive Server. Sybase strongly recommends that you use user name and password authentication.
