Friday September 14, 2007

OpenDS 1.0.0-build005 is now available

NOTE: -- Even though it is displayed as an option in the QuickSetup installer, we do not support upgrading from previous OpenDS builds to the 1.0.0-build005 release. There are some changes in this release that are not backward compatible with the configuration used by previous releases, and these changes may cause the upgrade process to fail.

• Revision 2796 (Issue #2030) -- Update the filesystem entry cache to provide the ability to use a compact entry encoding.
  
  
• Revision 2804 (Issues #2104, 2162) -- Update a number of the command-line utilities so that they operate in interactive mode rather than non-interactive mode by default.
  
  
• Revision 2806 -- Update the account status notification handler API so that it is possible to provide additional properties along with the notification. This makes it possible to develop account status notification handlers that can act more intelligently and/or provide more useful information.
  
  
• Revision 2811 (Issue #2097) -- Fix a problem in which total update initialization can fail to send a message to the replication cache.
  
  
• Revision 2820 (Issues #43, 72) -- Implement support for the numSubordinates and hasSubordinates virtual attributes. Also, provide a new dbtest tool, which can be used to perform low-level debugging for the backends using the Berkeley DB Java Edition.
  
  
• Revision 2824 (Issue #581) -- Provide an SMTP account status notification handler that can be used to send e-mail messages whenever an account status notification is generated. The notification message can be sent to the user that is the target of the notification and/or a specified set of administrators. The messages that will be sent are generated based on user-editable templates.
  
  
• Revision 2843 (Issue #1831) -- Implement complete support for an interactive mode for dscfg. The tool now provides a menu-driven interface for examining and updating the server configuration.
  
  
• Revision 2856 -- Update the CreateRCScript tool so that it provides the ability to specify the user that the server should run as, and also lets the user specify the JAVA_HOME and JAVA_ARGS settings that should be used. Also, update the start-ds and stop-ds commands to support a "--quiet" argument, which causes them to not generate any output. This mode will be used when starting and stopping the server through the generated RC script.
  
  
• Revision 2877 -- Fix a memory leak that can occur when a backend based on the Berkeley DB Java Edition is disabled.
• Revision 2879 (Issue #2180) -- Fix a problem in the JE backend in which contention on an index key might cause that key to contain an incomplete or incorrect value.
  
  
• Revision 2882 (Issue #2205) -- Fix a problem that caused replication to behave incorrectly when a replicated change included an attribute type that was not defined in the schema of the target server.
  
  
• Revision 2889 (Issue #2158) -- Add support for storing compressed schema representations in the JE backend and re-enabled the compact entry encoding by default.
  
  
• Revision 2894 -- Add number of new configuration definitions for objects that were previously using "generic" definitions. This will help make it much easier for users to create new instances of these kinds of configuration objects.
  
  
• Revision 2899 -- Add new directory environment properties that can be used to indicate whether the server should maintain a configuration archive, and if so the maximum number of archived configurations that should be maintained.
  
  
• Revision 2900 (Issue #1945) -- Update the server so that it has the ability to save a copy of its current configuration into a ".startok" file whenever it starts successfully. Also, expose an option in the start-ds script and in the directory environment configuration that provide the ability to start the server using the "last known good" configuration rather than the current configuration.
  
  
• Revision 2904 (Issues #1481, 2031) -- Add the ability to set any Berkeley DB JE property in the server configuration, for both backends based on the Berkeley DB Java Edition and the filesystem entry cache.
  
  
• Revision 2913 (Issue #257) -- Implement support for a plugin that can be used to maintain referential integrity within the server. Whenever an entry is deleted or renamed, then any references to that entry in a specified set of attributes will be removed or renamed accordingly.
  
  
• Revision 2921 -- Update the LDAP connection handler to explicitly close the selector when it is disabled or the server is shut down to prevent problems with being unable to re-bind to that port when the server is restarted.
  
  
• Revision 2926 (Issue #139) -- Implement support for a maximum blocked write time limit in the LDAP connection handler. If an attempt to write data to the client is stalled for too long, then the client connection will be terminated.
  
  
• Revision 2932 (Issue #261) -- Implement support for a 7-bit clean plugin, which can be used to ensure that the values of a specified set of attributes will only be allowed to contain ASCII characters.
  
  
• Revision 2933 (Issue #2218) -- Update the LDIFPluginResult object to provide a mechanism that can be used to indicate why an entry should not be imported/exported.
  
  
• Revision 2935 (Issue #1830) -- Implement support for secure communication in the dsconfig utility.
  
  
• Revision 2950 (Issue #2216) -- Implement support for an LDIF connection handler, which may be configured to watch for new LDIF files to be created in a specified directory and have changes defined in those files automatically applied in the server through internal operations.
  
  
• Revision 2955 (Issue #2181) -- Implement support for delete and modify operations in the task backend.
  
  
• Revision 2961 -- Update a number of command-line tools that can be used to perform operations either directly against a backend or through the task backend so that if a port number and/or bind DN are provided, then the tool will default to using the tasks interface.
  
  
• Revision 2966 -- Implement support for encryption and authentication when using replication.
  
  
• Revision 2974 (Issue #2155) -- Update the server configuration so that a password storage scheme is referenced by its DN rather than the storage scheme name.
  
  
• Revision 2986 -- Update the replication changelog database so that it implements the backend API. This provides the ability to backup and restore the changelog database, and provides a groundwork for future LDAP access to the changelog contents.
  
  
• Revision 2998 (Issue #1594) -- Provide the ability to expose a monitor entry for the server entry cache.
  
  
• Revision 2999 (Issue #2057) -- Update the server to provide a basic framework to control when plugins will be invoked. In particular, this adds the ability to indicate whether a plugin should be invoked for internal operations, and it also adds the ability to have plugins that are notified whenever changes are applied through synchronization. The unique attribute plugin has been updated so that it can detect uniqueness conflicts introduced through synchronization and generate an alert to notify administrators of the problem.
  
  
• Revision 3006 -- Make a number of minor changes to improve server performance.
  
  
• Revision 3008 -- Update the server configuration handler to fix a problem in which some change listeners may not be notified when the associated entry is updated.
  
  
• Revision 3024 -- Make a number of additional changes to improve server performance.
  
  
• Revision 3031 (Issues #1335, 1336, 1878, 2201, 2250) -- Provide new utilities that can be used to configure the server to participate in a replication environment.
  
  
• Revision 3033 -- Upgrade the Berkeley DB Java Edition library to version 3.2.44.
  
  
• Revision 3044 -- Make a couple of minor changes to improve server performance.
  
  
• Revision 3048 -- Add a new tool that may be used to manage tasks defined in the server.
  
  
• Revision 3051 (Issue #2059) -- Display SHA-1 and MD5 digests of a certificate fingerprint instead of the complete certificate when prompting the user about whether the certificate should be trusted in the status panel.
  
  
• Revision 3054 -- Update the server so that it is possible to call EmbeddedUtils.startServer after having previously called EmbeddedUtils.stopServer. Previously, the server shutdown process did not leave the server in a sufficient state to allow it to be restarted in the same JVM.
  
  

Friday June 08, 2007

OpenDS 0.9.0-build003 is now available

• Revision 1997 (Issue #1749) -- Update the way that privileges are evaluated by the server. Previously, they were always evaluated based on the authentication identity. Now, all privileges except proxied-auth are evaluated based on the authorization identity.
  
  
• Revision 2000 (Issue #1760) -- Fix a problem in the access control implementation that could prevent the use of operational attributes in the userattr bind rule.
  
  
• Revision 2001 -- Rename the default error log file name from "error" to "errors" in order to be more consistent with other products.
  
  
• Revision 2002 (Issue #1758) -- Update the server to provide a lockdown mode. This is a mode in which the server will only allow client connections over loopback interfaces, and will reject all requests from non-root users. A task has been added that can allow an administrator to manually enable or disable this mode, and an internal API is available to expose it to other server components.
  
  
• Revision 2004 (issue #609) -- Update the replication mechanism to provide modify conflict resolution for single-valued attributes. This uses a different mechanism than for multi-valued attributes and can allow the server to maintain less historical information for the attribute.
  
  
• Revision 2009 (Issue #1761) -- Fix a problem that could prevent the QuickSetup installer from running properly (especially on Windows systems) if JAVA_HOME is not set.
  
  
• Revision 2010 -- Fix a problem in the error logger that prevented an override severity of "all" from being handled properly.
  
  
• Revision 2011 (Issue #1753) -- Fix a problem on Windows systems where manually running the setup utility where arguments could be incorrectly interpreted.
  
  
• Revision 2017 (Issue #1601) -- Update the QuickSetup and Status Panel tools to improve the way that they handle focus changes between components so that it is easier to interact with these tools using only the keyboard.
  
  
• Revision 2021 (Issue #1616) -- Update the QuickSetup tool so that it will always provide a button that can be used to launch the status panel even if the installation fails.
  
  
• Revision 2024 (Issue #1634) -- Update the GUI tools so that when a text field gets input focus, its text is automatically selected.
  
  
• Revision 2025 (Issue #1764) -- Fix a problem in the replication initialization where it can enter an infinite loop if there is no replication server available.
  
  
• Revision 2026 (Issue #1117) -- Provide an entry cache implementation that is backed by a Berkeley DB JE instance. The backing database can be placed on a tmpfs or other kind of memory-based filesystem to allow for a space-efficient caching mechanism.
  
  
• Revision 2042 (Issue #1750) -- Update the access control handler so that if it encounters any access control rules that cannot be parsed when the server is starting up, they will be logged and the server will be placed in lockdown mode. This will help avoid problems in which an incorrectly-specified access control rule wouldn't be enforced as an administrator intended and inadvertently grant too much access to users.
  
  
• Revision 2045 (Issue #1729) -- Make changes to the server to allow for better integration with the Penrose virtual directory product.
  
  
• Revision 2046 (Issue #1633) -- Ensure that the JMX connection handler is disabled by default. Given that there is currently no way to configure it in the QuickSetup utility, it is better to have it disabled than running, potentially without the administrator knowing about it.
  
  
• Revision 2048 -- Update the global ACI definitions so that they allow read access to the entryUUID operational attribute.
  
  
• Revision 2049 (Issues 660, 1675, 1770) -- Provide a new mechanism for encoding entries. This provides a mechanism for excluding the DN from the encoded entry (which can be helpful for the filesystem entry cache), and also for compressing the object class sets and attribute descriptions to conserve space and improve encode/decode performance.
  
  
• Revision 2050 (Issue #1775) -- Add a virtual attribute provider that can be used to assign entryUUID values for entries in private backends. The entryUUID values for these entries will be based on an MD5 digest of the normalized DN, but this should not present an instability problem because these entries aren't allowed to be renamed.
  
  
• Revision 2051 (Issues #1765, 1776) -- Eliminate the search-unindexed privilege, since the unindexed-search privilege was added to do the same thing. Also, eliminate the index-rebuild privilege and fold all of its functionality into the ldif-import privilege, since having it as a separate privilege didn't add much value and created unnecessary administrative overhead.
  
  
• Revision 2052 -- Update the entry cache initialization process so that a default entry cache is always instantiated before the backends are brought online. This helps avoid problems in backends that attempt to interact with the cache before the full entry cache initialization is complete.
  
  

Monday June 04, 2007

A Comparison of OpenDS and DSEE Functionality

Friday June 01, 2007

OpenDS 0.9.0-build002 is now available

• Revision 1924 -- Add support for trailing arguments in the command-line parser.
  
  
• Revision 1926 (Issue #1606) -- Fix an access control problem that could cause some attributes to be incorrectly excluded from search results. Also, correct a problem with the way that userattr bind rule was interpreted.
  
  
• Revision 1928 (Issue #1621) -- Fix an access control problem that could cause incorrect evaluation for search filters using a NOT component.
  
  
• Revision 1934 (Issue #202) -- Fix a problem that could cause warnings about setting log file permissions on Windows systems.
  
  
• Revision 1951 (Issue #1085) -- Make changes to the synchronization protocol to ensure that it can remain extensible and backward compatible across OpenDS versions.
  
  
• Revision 1953 (Issue #1623) -- Fix a problem that prevented the access control handler from properly applying a target that was equal to the root DSE.
  
  
• Revision 1966 (Issue #1103) -- Add monitor data for replication naming/modify conflicts, including the number of unresolved naming conflicts, the number of resolved naming conflicts, and the number of resolved modify conflicts since startup. This change was contributed by Chris Drake.
  
  
• Revision 1967 (Issue #1561) -- Make sure that all threads are terminated before returning upon disabling a replication domain.
  
  
• Revision 1968 (Issue #1323) -- Fix a problem that could cause error messages on startup with replication enabled due to two replication servers connecting to each other at the same time.
  
  
• Revision 1975 (Issue #1624) -- Fix a string index out of range exception that could be encountered during a replication total update.
  
  
• Revision 1982 (Issue #1620) -- Fix a problem that could cause get effective rights results to be incorrect for the delete and proxy rights.
  
  
• Revision 1984 -- Fix a misplaced quotation mark in the server access log for search operations that included the proxied authorization control.
  
  

Friday May 18, 2007

OpenDS 0.9.0-build001 is now available

• Revision 1835 -- Update the QuickSetup code to eliminate references to classes in OpenDS.jar, which could force QuickSetup to have to download that JAR file before displaying the setup box instead of being able to download it in the background.
• Revision 1837 -- Update the Windows batch files so that they will pause if an error occurs because no suitable JVM was found. This makes it possible for users to see the error message if the batch file was launched in a graphical mode (e.g., by double-clicking the icon in Windows Explorer).
• Revision 1839 -- Update the status panel so that it will resize itself whenever the user first authenticates. This will allow it to be big enough for the user to see all of its content.
• Revision 1841 -- Update the status panel so that it does not display replication monitoring information if replication is not enabled.
• Revision 1842 (Issue #1585) -- Update the server so that the audit logger is disabled by default. Also, change the format of the audit log messages so that they use standard LDIF change syntax and therefore can be easily replayed if necessary.
• Revision 1843 (Issue #1584) -- Update the DSML gateway so that it properly treats the request ID as optional rather than required. Also, update the DSML search processing so that it is more forgiving when parsing scope and deref policy strings.
• Revision 1850 (Issue #1597) -- Fix a typo in the name of the "pilotPerson" object class.
• Revision 1856 (Issue #612) -- Update the replication code so that it can replay operations in parallel using multiple threads while still preserving dependencies between operations (e.g., ensuring that a child is always added after its parent).
• Revision 1861 (Issue #1604) -- Update the status command so that it allows reading the user password from standard input.
• Revision 1868 (Issue #1507) -- Update the search processing code of the Berkeley DB JE backend so that any unindexed searches will be checked against the virtual attribute subsystem to see if any of the virtual attribute providers may be used to process the search.
• Revision 1873 (Issue #1502) -- Fix an issue with the override severity configuration for the error logger so that it works as described in the documentation. Also, rename the error and debug logging levels so that they use all lowercase characters and dashes rather than underscores.
• Revision 1875 (Issue #1430) -- Update the LDAP protocol tools so that they provide a "--version" argument to display information about the version of the tool.
• Revision 1889 (Issue #1283) -- Change the filename for backups created by the Berkeley DB JE backend so that they no longer contain a ".zip" extension. Even though some forms of the backups do use zip format, others (e.g., when encryption is enable) do not.
• Revision 1890 (Issues #1479, 1587, 1606) -- Update the access control processing code so that operational attributes do not get automatically included by clauses like (targetattr="*").
• Revision 1897 (Issue #1615) -- Fix a problem that could prevent the server from starting under certain network configurations.
• Revision 1907 -- Perform miscellaneous cleanup and bugfixes identified by the FindBugs utility.
• Revision 1908 (Issue #1614) -- Add a stub to preserve the previous HistoricalCsnOrderingMatchingRule in its original package to allow older databases to continue to be used with upgraded versions of the server.
• Revision 1918 (Issue #1622) -- Add global ACIs that allow anonymous read access to certain key operational attributes, like those in the root DSE and schema subentries, as well as server-wide attributes like entryDN, modifiersName, and modifyTimestamp.

OpenDS and Other Sun-Sponsored Open Source Projects

Monday May 14, 2007

The OpenDS Virtual Attribute Subsystem

• The entryDN provider -- This is used to compute the entryDN operational attribute, which simply contains the DN of the entry. (as defined in draft-zeilenga-ldap-entrydn).
• The subschemaSubentry provider -- This is used to compute the subschemaSubentry operational attribute, which is used to specify the location of the schema governing the associated entry (as defined in RFC 4512).
• The isMemberOf provider -- This is used to compute the isMemberOf attribute, which lists the DNs of the groups in which the associated user is a member.
• The member provider -- This is used to compute the member or uniqueMember attribute for virtual static groups.
• The user-defined provider -- This is used to allow users to define their own virtual attributes that will appear in entries based on a given set of criteria. More information about user-defined virtual attributes is provided below.

Virtual Attribute Configuration

• ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-class -- This specifies the class providing the virtual attribute logic.
• ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-enabled -- This indicates whether the virtual attribute should be enabled so that it can generate values for the target entries.
• ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-type -- This specifies the name of the attribute type for which the values will be generated
• ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-conflict-behavior -- This specifies how the server should behave if an entry already has one or more real values for an attribute that could be virtually generated. Allowed values are "real-overrides-virtual" (to indicate that only the real values should be used), "virtual-overrides-real" (to indicate that the real values should be ignored and only the virtual values should be used), and "merge-real-and-virtual" (in which both the real and virtual values will be used).

• ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-base-dn -- This specifies the base DN(s) for the branches below which the virtual attribute may be used. If this is present, then only entries below one of the specified base DNs may include the virtual attribute.
• ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-filter -- This specifies a search filter that may be used to control the entries in which the virtual attribute may be used. If this is present, then only entries matching at least one of the specified filters may include the virtual attribute.
• ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-group-dn -- This specifies the DN(s) for the groups whose members will be allowed to have this virtual attribute. If this is present, then only user entries belonging to one of the specified groups may include the virtual attribute.

User-Defined Virtual Attributes

dn: cn=Austin postalCode,cn=Virtual Attributes,cn=config
objectClass: top
objectClass: ds-cfg-virtual-attribute
objectClass: ds-cfg-user-defined-virtual-attribute
cn: Austin postalCode
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-class: org.opends.server.extensions.UserDefinedVirtualAttributeProvider
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-enabled: true
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-type: postalCode
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-value: 78727
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-conflict-behavior: real-overrides-virtual
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-base-dn: ou=People,dc=example,dc=com
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-filter: (&(l=Austin)(st=Texas))

dn: cn=Administrator Privileges,cn=Virtual Attributes,cn=config
objectClass: top
objectClass: ds-cfg-virtual-attribute
objectClass: ds-cfg-user-defined-virtual-attribute
cn: Administrator Privileges
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-class: org.opends.server.extensions.UserDefinedVirtualAttributeProvider
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-enabled: true
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-type: ds-privilege-name
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-value: modify-acl
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-value: config-read
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-value: config-write
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-value: ldif-import
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-value: ldif-export
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-value: backend-backup
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-value: backend-restore
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-value: password-reset
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-value: update-schema
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-conflict-behavior: merge-real-and-virtual
ds-cfg-virtual-attribute-group-dn: cn=Administrators,ou=Groups,dc=example,dc=com

Friday May 11, 2007

Virtual Static Groups in OpenDS

dn: cn=Austin Users,ou=Groups,dc=example,dc=com
objectClass: top
objectClass: groupOfURLs
cn: Austin Users
memberURL: ldap:///ou=People,dc=example,dc=com??sub?(&(l=Austin)(st=Texas))

dn: cn=Virtual Static Austin Users,ou=Groups,dc=example,dc=com
objectClass: top
objectClass: groupOfUniqueNames
objectClass: ds-virtual-static-group
cn: Virtual Static Austin Users
ds-target-group-dn: cn=Austin Users,ou=Groups,dc=example,dc=com

dn: uid=nawilson,ou=People,dc=example,dc=com
objectClass: top
objectClass: person
objectClass: organizationalPerson
objectClass: inetOrgPerson
uid: nawilson
givenName: Neil
sn: Wilson
cn: Neil Wilson
l: Austin
st: Texas

dn: uid=bowendk,ou=People,dc=example,dc=com
objectClass: top
objectClass: person
objectClass: organizationalPerson
objectClass: inetOrgPerson
uid: bowendk
givenName: Don
sn: Bowen
cn: Don Bowen
l: Peoria
st: Illinois

$ bin/ldapsearch -b 'cn=Virtual Static Austin Users,ou=Groups,dc=example,dc=com' \
  -s base --countEntries '(uniqueMember=uid=nawilson,ou=People,dc=example,dc=com)' 1.1
dn: cn=Virtual Static Austin Users,ou=Groups,dc=example,dc=com

# Total number of matching entries:  1

$ bin/ldapsearch -b 'cn=Virtual Static Austin Users,ou=Groups,dc=example,dc=com' \
  -s base --countEntries '(uniqueMember=uid=bowendk,ou=People,dc=example,dc=com)' 1.1
# Total number of matching entries:  0

Tuesday May 08, 2007

OpenDS builds on OpenJDK on OpenSolaris

1. I started in /export/home/nawilson/sandbox, which is the directory that I use to hold all of the source code I check out from various repositories.
   
   
2. I checked out the OpenJDK source code with the command:
   

   svn checkout --username guest https://openjdk.dev.java.net/svn/openjdk

   When prompted for a password, I just pressed ENTER without typing anything.
   
   
3. Once the checkout completed, I went into the openjdk/hotspot/trunk directory.
   
   
4. I found the page http://openjdk.java.net/groups/hotspot/faq.html, which is the HotSpot FAQ, and on that page I found a link to the osse-build-solaris-i586 file that can be used as a simple build script. I downloaded that file and copied it into the current working directory. I then edited it to point both ALT_BOOTDIR and ALT_JDK_IMPORT_PATH to "/usr/java".
   
   
5. I edited my path so that /opt/SUNWspro/bin was the first directory contained in it. This was necessary to make sure that the Sun Studio 11 compiler was getting used instead of /usr/ucb/cc which fails right away.
   
   
6. I made the edited osse-build-solaris-i586 file executable and ran it without any arguments. About two hours later, I had a full JDK 1.6.0_01-b06 build in the build/solaris/jdk-solaris-i586 subdirectory.
   
   
7. I returned to the /export/home/nawilson/sandbox directory and checked out OpenDS with the command:
   

   svn checkout --username guest https://opends.dev.java.net/svn/opends/trunk/opends

   Once the checkout completed, I went into the opends subdirectory.
   
   
8. I set the JAVA_HOME environment variable to /export/home/nawilson/sandbox/openjdk/hotspot/trunk/build/solaris/jdk-solaris-i586 and ran "./build.sh" with no arguments. About 33 seconds later, I had a build/package/OpenDS-0.8.zip file containing the core OpenDS server.
   
   
9. I went into the build/package/OpenDS-0.8 directory and ran ./setup to launch our QuickSetup utility to configure the server, populate it with sample data, start it up, and use our graphical status panel to verify that everything looks fine.

OpenDS 0.8 Is Now Available

• We have added support for updating the schema with the server online. You can do this using modify operations, or using an "add schema file" task to add a new schema file. The schema file structure will be preserved, even when schema changes are replicated between servers.
  
  
• We have added support for subordinate attribute types. Specifying a superior attribute will target all of its subordinate types (e.g., referencing attribute "name", will include attributes like cn, sn, givenName, initials, c, l, st, o, ou, title, and generationQualifier).
  
  
• We have added a lastmod plugin that maintains the creatorsName, createTimestamp, modifiersName, and modifyTimestamp attributes.
  
  
• We have implemented a DSEE-compatible access control handler. This uses the aci attribute with a syntax that is handled like that in the Sun Java System Directory Server. See Managing Access Control for information on OpenDS support for access control.
  
  
• We have implemented a privileges subsystem to make it possible to configure capabilities on a fine-grained level. You can use this to remove privileges from root users, or grant additional privileges to non-root users. See Root Users and Privileges for more information.
  
  
• We have added support for the proxied authorization control, which makes it possible to perform an operation as one user while authenticated as another. We have also added support for using an alternate authorization identity when using SASL DIGEST-MD5 or PLAIN mechanisms.
  
  
• We have added support for the get effective rights control, which can be used to determine what rights a user has for a particular entry.
  
  
• We have added support for the server-side sort control, which can be used to sort entries before returning them to the client. We have also added support for the virtual list view control, which can be used in conjunction with the server-side sort control to retrieve the result set in pages rather than all at once.
  
  
• We have added support for rejecting requests from unauthenticated clients. When operating in this mode, the server will require that clients authenticate before requesting any operations other than bind and StartTLS.
  
  
• We have added support for groups. This includes static groups (both groupOfNames and groupOfUniqueNames variants) and dynamic groups (based on groupOfURLs). We have also added support for virtual static groups, which makes it possible to mirror a dynamic group as a static group.
  
  
• We have improved support for SSL and StartTLS, including making it possible to configure them through the QuickSetup utility, and providing the ability to use different certificates for different listeners. We have added a number of new certificate mappers that can be used to map a certificate to a user entry when performing SASL EXTERNAL authentication.
  
  
• We have added a number of password validators to the server. One looks at how similar the new password is to the user's current password. One looks at whether the new password matches the value of other attributes in the user entry. One looks at whether the new password matches a value in a dictionary. One looks at the sets of characters included in the new password. One looks at the number of unique characters in the password. One looks at whether there are strings of repeated characters in the password.
  
  
• We have implemented support for the CRYPT password storage scheme, which may be needed by some UNIX clients to use the OpenDS for authenticating users.
  
  
• We have added a virtual attribute subsystem, including implementing support for the standard entryDN and subschemaSubentry attributes. We also have added support for isMemberOf, which will include the DNs of all groups in which the associated user is a member. We also have support for user-defined virtual attributes, much like the Class of Service functionality in the Sun Java System Directory Server.
  
  
• We have added support for rebuilding indexes, both as an offline operation or with the server online using the tasks interface.
  
  
• We have improved support for configuration archiving in the server, so that it includes changes made with the server offline. We have also implemented a mechanism for detecting external changes to the configuration file with the server online.
  
  
• We have improved support for Windows systems, including the ability to run as a service.
  
  

Monday May 07, 2007

OpenDS Documentation Wiki

• The OpenDS QuickSetup Tool -- Information about how to install OpenDS using the QuickSetup tool with Java Web Start.
  
  
• Quick Reference Guide -- Basic information about how to do a lot of key things with the server.
  
  
• Configuration Guide -- A thorough reference for the server configuration.
  
  
• Command Line Usage Guide -- Usage information for all of the command line utilities.
  
  
• Using OpenDS with Specific Directory-Enabled Applications -- How to use OpenDS with several popular applications and other types of software.
  
  
• Configuring SSL and StartTLS -- How to get OpenDS working with secure communication mechanisms.
  
  
• Configuring Replication -- How to configure replication to synchronize information between servers.
  
  
• OpenDS Source Guide -- How to check out and build OpenDS, information about the repository layout, and information about the source structure.
  
  
• Directory Server Standards and Specifications -- Links to a number of RFCs, Internet Drafts, and other documents covering LDAP and directory services.
  
  

Monday March 05, 2007

Read-Only Replicas Considered Harmful

• Binary copy becomes much easier since you only have one type of server to manage. You can't use binary initialization from a master to a consumer (or vice versa), but if you have only masters then you can use binary copy between them as long as they meet the other constraints (e.g., they have the same system architecture, filesystem layout, and indexing configuration).
  
  
• Password policy works better across the environment. If you have account lockout enabled and you try to authenticate to a read-only replica, then the failure counter will only be updated on that one replica but other servers in the environment won't know about it. But if it happens on a master, then that login failure will be replicated throughout the environment so that other servers will see it as well. The same is also true for the last login time functionality if you want to enable that.
  
  
• If there are read-only replicas in the environment, then clients that try to modify them will need to be able to handle referrals, and in the event that they do encounter a referral and send their write somewhere else then they could still have to deal with issues around propagation delay if they immediately read the entry back from the read-only server after having to perform the write somewhere else. As I mentioned before, Directory Proxy Server can follow referrals on behalf of the client, and in fact the new release has features like server affinity that help avoid problems with propagation delay. However, if there are any clients that attempt to directly communicate with the server instead of going through a proxy, then it's a lot easier if all the servers are masters.
  
  
• In the past, there were cases in which you were able to get higher modify performance if you constrained yourself to only sending writes to one server. That's not true anymore, and in fact you'll probably find that you get better overall write performance by spreading the writes out across multiple servers than you do if you just send them to one instance.
  
  

Thursday March 01, 2007

Data Distribution in DSEE 6

Monday February 12, 2007

LDAP, Transactions, and OpenDS

• Modify DN Operation -- In its simplest form, this operation simply changes the RDN of a leaf entry. However, it also provides the ability to move the entry below a new parent, and it doesn't necessarily need to be performed on a leaf entry. In fact, the modify DN operation can be used to rename an entire subtree (in which case all entries in that subtree will be renamed as a single atomic unit), although we do recommend that it be restricted to small subtrees to avoid locking huge portions of the tree while the operation is in progress. This capability is currently available in OpenDS, and will also be available in the imminent release of the Sun Java System Directory Server 6.0.
  
  
• Subtree Delete Operation -- draft-armijo-ldap-treedelete defines a control which can be used to delete an entire subtree of entries as a single atomic operation. OpenDS currently supports this capability.
  
  
• LDAP Increment Modify Extension -- RFC 4525 defines a new "increment" attribute modification type which can be used to atomically increment or decrement the integer value of an attribute, without the need to know its current value. This can be particularly useful in conjunction with the LDAP read entry controls as described below. OpenDS currently supports this capability.
  
  
• LDAP Read Entry Controls -- RFC 4527 defines a pair of controls which can be used to atomically retrieve an entry as it appeared either immediately before or immediately after applying some change. This can be used to obtain an atomic "set and check" type of behavior, especially when combined with the increment extension. OpenDS currently supports this capability.
  
  
• LDAP Assertion Control -- RFC 4528 defines a control which can be used to perform an operation only if a given assertion is satisfied. This can be used to obtain an atomic "check and set" type of behavior. OpenDS currently supports this capability.
  
  
• LDAP Transactions -- draft-zeilenga-ldap-txn defines a set of extended operations and controls that can be used to perform multiple write operations as a single atomic entity. This draft currently isn't quite far enough along yet to have official OIDs assigned for these components, but we do intend to provide support for it in OpenDS.
  
  

Friday January 26, 2007

Understanding Schema in OpenDS