Personal LDAP Server

I've been thinking recently about the fact that I have 4 separate address books on my computers, all managed by Evolution. My laptop has one, my home desktop has one, my work desktop has one, and we have started configuring an LDAP server at work too. Obviously none of these are synced and this is a right mess.

So, why can't I run a personal LDAP server? I was thinking about a minimal LDAP implementation (just enough to keep Evolution happy) which writes Maildir-style to many files, meaning Unison can be used to sync any changes. Or write a new backend for OpenLDAP which writes multiple files instead of this posh bdb business. Or use OpenLDAP with the default backend and use the LDAP Sync protocol, which may or may not do what I want.

Of course this hits problems -- an LDAP server needs to open a port, so what port does it open if it is started by a user, and what happens if multiple people login on the same machine. SLP or D-Bus could be used to find the LDAP server, but this is getting rapidly too complicated.

I know Havoc was wondering about LDAP for every user, and I've heard rumours that MacOS X comes configured with a bit of the LDAP server for every user. If anyone knows of answers to my problems, please contact me.

NP: From the Choirgirl Hotel, by Tori Amos (very loudly).

12:09 Wednesday, 21 Jan 2004 [#] [computers] (7 comments)

Posted by Sean Etc at Wed Jan 21 15:02:00 2004:
Have you considered using something like Zeroconf for this?  The Howl implementation is particularly nice.
Posted by Beppo Verde at Wed Jan 21 15:42:43 2004:
Pluggable User Metadata Modules with whatever backend, combined with a tweak to NetShard.  That'd be my recommendation.

When on the road, use NetShard to log in to your PersoNet, where you can use a designated channel to sync addressbook data (amongst other things, e.g. calendars).

Just one problem: I just have to write PUMM and NetShard.  ;)
Posted by Kevin Breit at Wed Jan 21 16:04:50 2004:
I setup a personal OpenLDAP server a while ago.  It worked well and was wonderful to use.  Unfortunately, I don't know how to properly administrate it.  This meant that there'd be a 10 second look-up from Evolution before it would return a result.  That is on the same network, leave alone around the world.  I also didn't feel it was sufficiently secure.
Posted by Strass at Wed Jan 21 20:45:40 2004:
Maybe just a personal LDAP server to host your personal branch of your enterprise tree ?
So that somewhere on the enterprise network, you could have the complete tree hosted. The personnal branches are hosted on the personal computer. And each personal branches are synced via some LDAP mechanism with their corresponding branches on the enterprise tree.
Just a thougth.
Maybe I'll do some graphic tomorrow...
Posted by Diego at Sat Feb 14 10:58:12 2004:
i just found this, http://www.fefe.de/tinyldap/ it is a small ldap server (11k binary) that implements some of the ldap protocol, it is pretty fast.
Posted by Ross at Sat Feb 14 12:39:39 2004:
tinyldap is small/fast/etc, but sadly it is read only...
Posted by Matthew at Tue Sep 20 18:12:30 2005:
Did you ever "fix" this problem? I've recently gone to a hosting solution where I pop my email. I'd like to setup an LDAP so I have a central place for all my contact info.

So, did you find an LDAP solution? have you any suggestions?

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