All policies are stored in a central configuration repository, such as an LDAP
server (7). A policy is the term for a group of semantically
coherent configuration settings. A Configuration Agent (3), running on each client machine,
is responsible for retrieving the policy data from the LDAP server, and for caching
the data locally (2). The Configuration Agent periodically checks for any changes on the
LDAP server, and updates the cache accordingly. Furthermore, the Configuration Agent sends
notifications to all interested applications. Desktop applications, such as StarOffice
, Mozilla
, Evolution
or GNOME
, read the policies by means of corresponding adapters (1). These adapters
encapsulate the necessary communication with the cache and the Configuration Agent.