Mellanox MLNX-OS® User Manualfor SX1018HP Ethernet Managed Blade Switch
Rev 1.6.9
Mellanox Technologies
55
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It is used for several reasons:
• RADIUS facilitates centralized user administration
• RADIUS consistently provides some level of protection against
an active attacker
For information on the RADIUS commands, please
refer to Mellanox MLNX-OS Command Ref-
erence Guide.
4.10.1.2 TACACS+
TACACS (Terminal Access Controller Access Control System), widely use
d in network environ-
ments, is a client/server protocol that enables remote
access servers to communicate with a cen-
tral server to authenticate dial-in users and authorize their acce
ss to the requested system or
service. It is commonly used for providing NAS (Network Access Security). NAS ensures secure
access from remotely connected users. TACACS implements the TACACS Client and provides
the AAA (Authentication, Authorization and Accounting) functionalities.
TACACS is used for several reasons:
• Facilitates centralized user administration
• Uses TCP for transport to
ensure reliable delivery
• Supports inbound authentication, outbound authentication and change password request
for the authentication service
• Provides some level of protection against an
active attacker
For information on the TACACS+
commands, please refer to Mellanox MLNX-OS Command
Reference Guide.
4.10.1.3 LDAP
LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) is a
n authentication protocol that allows a
remote access server to forward a user's logon password to an authentication server to determine
whether access can be allowed to a given system. LDAP is based on a client/server model. The
switch acts as a client to the LDAP server. A remote user (the remote administrator) interacts
only with the switch, not the back-end server and database.
LDAP authentication consists of the following co
mponents:
• A protocol with a frame format that utilizes TCP over IP
• A centralized server that stores all
the user authorization information
• A client: in this case, the switch
Each entry in the LDAP server is
referenced by its Distinguished Name (DN). The DN consists
of the user-account name concatenated with the LDAP domain name. If the user-account name is
John, the following is an example DN:
uid=John,ou=people,dc=domain,dc=com
For information on the LDAP commands, please refer to Mellanox MLNX-OS Command Refer-
ence Guide.










