Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP)

To understand Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) you must first understand directory services. This article defines directory services and how LDAP structures the entries in a directory service. Pay attention to the basic LDAP components such as attributes, entries, and data information trees (DITs). How does LDAP organize data, and what is LDAP inheritance? Note that there are some variations in LDAP protocols.

Basic LDAP Data Components

We discussed above how LDAP is a protocol used to communicate with a directory database to query, add or modify information. However, this simple definition misrepresents the complexity of the systems that support this protocol. The way that LDAP displays data to users is very dependent upon the interaction of and relationship between some defined structural components.