Ubuntu Manpage: nss_ldap - LDAP nameservice provider

Provided by: libnss-ldap_265-5ubuntu3_amd64

NAME

       nss_ldap - LDAP nameservice provider

DESCRIPTION

The nss_ldap module is a set of C library extensions which allows X.500 and LDAP directory servers to be
used as a primary source of name service information. (Name service information typically includes users,
hosts, groups, and other such data historically stored in flat files or NIS.)

Features of the PADL nss_ldap module include support for both the RFC 2307 and RFC 2307bis schema, a
common implementation across multiple platforms, Kerberos and SSL security, configurable schema mapping,
and configuration file compatibility with the pam_ldap(5) module.

Because LDAP is a hierarchical directory service, one can distribute the information in a manner which
reflects organizational structure. This contrasts with the flat, single domain policy of NIS. LDAP has
many of the advantages of NIS+ (security and scalability) without the complexity.

nss_ldap will work alongside existing NIS, NIS+, DNS and flat file name services. More importantly,
because it builds as a shared library, it is not necessary to recompile any applications to take
advantage of LDAP.

The present version of nss_ldap supports AIX 4.3.3 and above, FreeBSD 5.1, HP-UX 11i, Linux and Solaris
2.6 and above. Many vendors provide their own LDAP nameservice providers, often also called nss_ldap.
This manual page applies to the PADL nss_ldap module only. If you are using a vendor provided module,
consult the relevant documentation instead.

The features supported by the version of nss_ldap depend on which flags were enabled when the software
was built. Most features are enabled in the configuration file, described below. (The location of the
configuration file is configurable at compile time; the default path is /etc/ldap.conf.) Also, some
features may be unavailable on certain operating systems or with certain LDAP libraries. For more
information, consult your vendor.

CONFIGURATION

nss_ldap stores its configuration in the ldap.conf file, the location of which is configurable at compile
time. (It should be noted that some LDAP client libraries, such as OpenLDAP, also use a configuration
file of the same name. nss_ldap supports many of the same configuration file options as OpenLDAP, but it
adds several that are specific to the functionality it provides. Additionally, it is not guaranteed that
nss_ldap will continue to match the configuration file semantics of OpenLDAP. You may wish to use
different files.)

Configuration file options consist of a keyword followed by a space and any arguments. The following
options are supported by both nss_ldap and the PADL pam_ldap module:

host <name:port ...>
Specifies the name(s) or IP address(es) of the LDAP server(s) to connect to. In the case that
nss_ldap is used for host name resolution, each server should be specified as an IP address or
name that can be resolved without using LDAP. Multiple servers may be specified, each separated
by a space. The failover time depends on whether the LDAP client library supports configurable
network or connect timeouts (see bind_timelimit below).

base <base>
Specifies the default base distinguished name (DN) to use for searches.

uri <ldap[is]://[name[:port]] ...>
For LDAP client libraries that support it, specifies the URI(s) of the LDAP server(s) to connect
to. The URI scheme may be ldap, ldapi, or ldaps, specifying LDAP over TCP, IPC and SSL
respectively. If applicable, a port number can be specified; the default port number for the
selected protocol is used if omitted. This option takes precedence over the host option; it is not
possible to combine the two.

ldap_version <version>
Specifies the version of the LDAP protocol to use. Presently version must be 2 or 3. The default
is to use the maximum version supported by the client library.

binddn <binddn>
Specifies the distinguished name with which to bind to the directory server(s). This option is
optional; the default is to bind anonymously.

bindpw <bindpw>
Specifies the cleartext credentials with which to bind. This option is only applicable when used
with binddn above. The default is no credential (anonymous bind). When binding to the directory
using SASL or other authentication mechanisms apart from simple binds, this option is not used.

rootbinddn <binddn>
This option has the same syntax and effect as the binddn option above, except it applies when the
effective user ID is zero. If not specified, then the identity specified in binddn is used
instead. Because the configuration file may be readable by many users, the root bind DN
credentials are stored in the ldap.secret file instead. This file is usually in the same directory
as the configuration file.

port <port>
Specifies the port to connect to; this option is used with the host option, and is ignored with
the uri option.

scope <sub|one|base>
Specifies the search scope (subtree, one level or base object). The default scope is subtree; base
scope is almost never useful for nameservice lookups.

deref <never|searching|finding|always>
Specifies the policy for dereferencing aliases. The default policy is to never dereference
aliases.

timelimit <timelimit>
Specifies the time limit (in seconds) to use when performing searches. A value of zero (0), which
is the default, is to wait indefinitely for searches to be completed.

bind_timelimit <timelimit>
Specifies the time limit (in seconds) to use when connecting to the directory server. This is
distinct from the time limit specified in timelimit and affects the initial server connection
only. (Server connections are otherwise cached.) Only some LDAP client libraries have the
underlying functionality necessary to support this option. The default bind timelimit is 30
seconds.

referrals <yes|no>
Specifies whether automatic referral chasing should be enabled. The default behaviour is specified
by the LDAP client library.

restart <yes|no>
Specifies whether the LDAP client library should restart the select(2) system call when
interrupted. This feature is not supported by all client libraries.

logdir <directory>
Specifies the directory used for logging by the LDAP client library. This feature is not supported
by all client libraries.

debug <level>
Specifies the debug level used for logging by the LDAP client library. This feature is not
supported by all client libraries, and does not apply to the nss_ldap and pam_ldap modules
themselves (debugging, if any, is configured separately and usually at compile time).

ssl <on|off|start_tls>
Specifies whether to use SSL/TLS or not (the default is not to). If start_tls is specified then
StartTLS is used rather than raw LDAP over SSL. Not all LDAP client libraries support both SSL
and StartTLS, and all related configuration options.

sslpath <cert7_path>
For the Netscape and Mozilla LDAP client libraries only, this specifies the path to the X.509
certificate database.

tls_checkpeer <yes|no>
Specifies whether to require and verify the server certificate or not, when using SSL/TLS with the
OpenLDAP client library. The default is to use the default behaviour of the client library; for
OpenLDAP 2.0 and earlier it is "no", for OpenLDAP 2.1 and later it is "yes". At least one of
tls_cacertdir and tls_cacertfile is required if peer verification is enabled.

tls_cacertdir <certificate_dir>
Specifies the directory containing X.509 certificates for peer authentication.

tls_cacertfile <certificate_file>
Specifies the path to the X.509 certificate for peer authentication.

tls_randfile <entropy_file>
Specifies the path to an entropy source.

tls_ciphers <ciphers>
Specifies the ciphers to use for TLS. See your TLS implementation's documentation for further
information.

tls_cert <certificate_file>
Specifies the path to the file containing the local certificate for client TLS authentication.

tls_key <key_file>
Specifies the path to the file containing the private key for client TLS authentication.

The following configuration options apply to nss_ldap only:

bind_policy <hard_open|hard_init|soft>
Specifies the policy to use for reconnecting to an unavailable LDAP server. The default is
hard_open, which reconnects if opening the connection to the directory server failed. By contrast,
hard_init reconnects if initializing the connection failed. Initializing may not actually contact
the directory server, and it is possible that a malformed configuration file will trigger
reconnection. If soft is specified, then nss_ldap will return immediately on server failure. All
"hard" reconnect policies block with exponential backoff before retrying.

nss_connect_policy <persist|oneshot>
Determines whether nss_ldap persists connections. The default is for the connection to the LDAP
server to remain open after the first request.

idle_timelimit <timelimit>
Specifies the time (in seconds) after which nss_ldap will close connections to the directory
server. The default is not to time out connections.

sasl_authid <authid>
Specifies the authorization identity to be used when performing SASL authentication.

rootsasl_auth_id <authid>
Specifies the authorization identity to be used when performing SASL authentication as root (when
the effective user ID is zero).

sasl_secprops <properties>
Specifies Cyrus SASL security properties. Allowed values are described in the ldap.conf(5) manual
page.

rootuse_sasl <yes|no>
Specifies whether SASL authentication should be used when the effective user ID is zero.

krb5_ccname <PREFIX:args>
If nss_ldap is built with configurable GSS-API credentials cache name support, specifies the
Kerberos credentials cache to use.

nss_paged_results <yes|no>
Enables support for paged results.

pagesize <pagesize>
When paged results are enabled (see above), specifies the number of entries to return in a single
page. The default is 1000.

nss_base_<map> <basedn?scope?filter>
Specify the search base, scope and filter to be used for specific maps. (Note that map forms part
of the configuration file keyword and is one of passwd, shadow, group, hosts, services, networks,
protocols, rpc, ethers, netmasks, bootparams, aliases and netgroup.) The syntax of basedn and
scope are the same as for the configuration file options of the same name, with the addition of
being able to omit the trailing suffix of the base DN (in which case the global base DN will be
appended instead). The filter is a search filter to be added to the default search filter for a
specific map, such that the effective filter is the logical intersection of the two. The base DN,
scope and filter are separated with literal question marks (?) as given above; this is for
compatibility with the DUA configuration profile schema and the ldapprofile tool. This option may
be specified multiple times.

nss_map_attribute <from_attribute> <to_attribute>
This option may be specified multiple times, and directs nss_ldap to use the attribute
to_attribute instead of the RFC 2307 attribute from_attribute in all lookups. If nss_ldap was
built without schema mapping support, then this option is ignored.

nss_map_objectclass <from_objectclass> <to_objectclass>
This option may be specified multiple times, and directs nss_ldap to use the object class
to_objectclass instead of the RFC 2307 object class from_objectclass in all lookups. If nss_ldap
was built without schema mapping support, then this option is ignored.

nss_default_attribute_value <attribute> <value>
Specifies the default value to use for entries that lack the specified attribute. This option may
be specified multiple times, for different attributes. If nss_ldap was built without schema
mapping support, then this option is ignored.

nss_override_attribute_value <attribute> <value>
Specifies a value to use for the specified attribute in preference to that contained in the actual
entry. This option may be specified multiple times, for different attributes. If nss_ldap was
built without schema mapping support, then this option is ignored.

nss_schema <rfc2307bis|rfc2307>
If the value of this option is rfc2307bis then support for the RFC2307bis schema (distinguished
names in groups) will be enabled.

nss_initgroups <backlink>
This option directs the nss_ldap implementation of initgroups(3) to determine a user's group
membership by reading the memberOf attribute of their directory entry (and of any nested groups),
rather than querying on uniqueMember. This may provide increased performance with certain
directory servers that have peculiar indexing configurations. If RFC2307bis support is disabled,
then this option is ignored.

nss_initgroups_ignoreusers <user1,user2,...,userN>
This option directs the nss_ldap implementation of initgroups(3) to return NSS_STATUS_NOTFOUND if
called with a listed users as its argument.

nss_getgrent_skipmembers <yes|no>
Specifies whether or not to populate the members list in the group structure for group lookups. If
very large groups are present, enabling this option will greatly increase performance, at the cost
of some lost functionality. You should verify no local applications rely on this information
before enabling this on a production system.

nss_srv_domain <domain>
This option determines the DNS domain used for performing SRV lookups.

AUTHOR

       The nss_ldap module was developed by PADL Software Pty Ltd (www.padl.com).

FILES

       /etc/ldap.conf, /etc/ldap.secret, /etc/nsswitch.conf

NAME

DESCRIPTION

CONFIGURATION

AUTHOR

FILES

SEE ALSO