LDAP integration

[David Nugent]

Freddie Cash wrote:
> To each their own, of course.  Personally, I am so sick of the way
> system like Debian use dozens of config files for each app, all in
> their own conf.d/ sub-directories.  Some apps, like PureFTPd actually
> use separate config files for each and every option it supports.
> Trying to configure these apps is a royal pain of opening and editing
> a dozen files.  Maybe this makes it easier for automated configuration
> tools and GUIs, but it makes it a *ROYAL* pain in the arse for mere
> mortals using text editors to manage.
>   
But management of config data is a user interface, surely, and not 
directly related to the underlying storage mechanism.

What is the logical difference between using a directory structure vs. 
an LDAP server containing essentially the same information (plus all of 
the overhead)? "dozens of config files" just equates to dozens of ldap 
entries (or dozens of entries in a single config file). Given the same 
or equivalent "friendly" UI, do you really care how the back end is 
managed? By moving the data to a directory you are making it less 
accessible to standard tools, so you're just removing the option to 
directly edit those config files and only gain on being able to use ldap 
editing tools instead of text editing tools. You could write a similarly 
"friendly" app that managed your conrfiguration files, and you won't 
need any LDAP expertise to use it.

Network access and management of configuration data are the real 
advantages here, not the UI. Integration of LDAP would provide close to 
(and arguably less than) zero  benefit to a stand alone system, really, 
and would effectively equate to a Windows registry with all of the pros 
and cons that come with that.

Regards
-d