blog/data/2010-06-24-ldap-schemas.txt

   1 Title: Idea for a change to LDAP schemas allowing DNS and DHCP info to be combined into one object
   2 Tags: english, debian, debian edu, nuug, ldap
   3 Date: 2010-06-24 00:35
   4
   5 <p>A while back, I
   6 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">complained
   7 about the fact</a> that it is not possible with the provided schemas
   8 for storing DNS and DHCP information in LDAP to combine the two sets
   9 of information into one LDAP object representing a computer.</p>
  10
  11 <p>In the mean time, I discovered that a simple fix would be to make
  12 the dhcpHost object class auxiliary, to allow it to be combined with
  13 the dNSDomain object class, and thus forming one object for one
  14 computer when storing both DHCP and DNS information in LDAP.</p>
  15
  16 <p>If I understand this correctly, it is not safe to do this change
  17 without also changing the assigned number for the object class, and I
  18 do not know enough about LDAP schema design to do that properly for
  19 Debian Edu.</p>
  20
  21 <p>Anyway, for future reference, this is how I believe we could change
  22 the
  23 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-dhc-ldap-schema-00">DHCP
  24 schema</a> to solve at least part of the problem with the LDAP schemas
  25 available today from IETF.</p>
  26
  27 <pre>
  28 --- dhcp.schema    (revision 65192)
  29 +++ dhcp.schema    (working copy)
  30 @@ -376,7 +376,7 @@
  31  objectclass ( 2.16.840.1.113719.1.203.6.6
  32         NAME 'dhcpHost'
  33         DESC 'This represents information about a particular client'
  34 -       SUP top
  35 +       SUP top AUXILIARY
  36         MUST cn
  37         MAY  (dhcpLeaseDN $ dhcpHWAddress $ dhcpOptionsDN $ dhcpStatements $ dhcpComments $ dhcpOption)
  38         X-NDS_CONTAINMENT ('dhcpService' 'dhcpSubnet' 'dhcpGroup') )
  39 </pre>
  40
  41 <p>I very much welcome clues on how to do this properly for Debian
  42 Edu/Squeeze.  We provide the DHCP schema in our debian-edu-config
  43 package, and should thus be free to rewrite it as we see fit.</p>
  44
  45 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
  46 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>