LDAP-UX Client Services B.05.01 Administrator Guide for HP directory servers and Windows ADS

1 Introduction
LDAP-UX Client Services simplifies HP-UX system administration by consolidating account and
configuration information into a central LDAP directory. The directory can be used as a single
source repository for HP-UX authentication, authorization, and user data/account management,
or the account information could be integrated into Microsoft Windows Active Directory Server.
The LDAP directory can reside on any LDAP-capable directory server, with tier one support provided
for the HP-UX Directory Server (HPDS) 8.1 (or later) and Red Hat Directory Server (RHDS) 8.0. It
can also reside on a Windows Server 2003 R2 or 2008. A directory server helps globalize
authentication; authorization; and management of users, accounts, and network information across
multiple systems in a large enterprise environment. The Windows Active Directory server integrates
the respective HP-UX management functionality with Windows clients.
1.1 Overview of LDAP-UX Client Services
Traditionally, HP-UX account and configuration information is stored in text files, for example, /
etc/passwd and /etc/group. NIS was developed to ease system administration by sharing
this information across systems on the network. With NIS, account and configuration information
resides on NIS servers. As shown in Figure 1, NIS client systems retrieve (and store) this shared
configuration information from NIS servers across the network.
Figure 1 A simplified NIS environment
NIS master server
Map Transfers
NIS Client Requests
NIS slave server NIS slave server
NIS client NIS clientNIS client
LDAP-UX Client Services improves on this configuration information sharing. HP-UX account and
configuration information is stored in an LDAP directory or Active Directory instead of on the local
client system. Client systems retrieve this shared configuration information across the network from
the directory, as shown in Figure 2 (page 18) (for a typical HP directory server ) and Figure 3
(page 18) (for Windows ADS). LDAP adds greater security, scalability, and less network traffic
from replica updates. In addition, because LDAP directory servers support management of any
type of object with extensible schema, integration with enterprise-class applications allows for
greater control and less management overhead. For example, provisioning a new employee and
HP-UX account can be an integrated and automated process.
1.1 Overview of LDAP-UX Client Services 17