Guidelines for Creating LDAP-based User Entries

Consider the following guidelines when using the administrator forms to create new user entries in an LDAP-based directory service:

• If you enter a given name (or first name) and a surname, then the form automatically populates the user’s full name and user ID for you. The user ID is generated as the first initial of the user’s first name followed by the user’s last name. For example, if the user’s name is Billie Holiday, then the user ID is automatically set to bholiday. You can replace this user ID with an ID of your own choice.

• The user ID must be unique. The Administration Server ensures that the user ID is unique by searching the entire directory from the search base (base DN) down to see if the user ID is in use. Be aware, however, that if you use the Directory Server ldapmodify command line utility (if available) to create a user, that it does not ensure unique user IDs. If duplicate user IDs exist in your directory, the affected users will not be able to authenticate to the directory.

• Note that the base DN specifies the distinguished name where directory lookups will occur by default, and where all Sun Java System Web Administration Server’s entries are placed in your directory tree. A “DN” is the string representation for the name of an entry in a directory server.

• Note that at a minimum, you must specify the following user information when creating a new user entry:

  • surname or last name

  • full name

  • user ID

  If any organizational units have been defined for your directory, you can specify where you want the new user to be placed by using the Add New User To list. The default location is your directory’s base DN (or root point).

The user edit text fields for international information differs between the Administration Server and the Sun Java System Web Server Administration Console. In the Sun Java System Web Server Administration Console, in addition to the untagged cn fields, there is a preferred language cn field which doesn’t exist in the Administration Server.