Naming Person Entries - Red Hat DIRECTORY SERVER 8.1 - DEPLOYMENT Deployment Manual

Chapter 4. Designing the Directory Tree
• The attribute selected for naming should be unlikely to change.
• The name must be unique across the directory.
A unique name ensures that a DN can refer to at most one entry in the directory.
When creating entries, define the RDN within the entry. By defining at least the RDN within the entry,
the entry can be located more easily. This is because searches are not performed against the actual
DN but rather the attribute values stored in the entry itself.
Attribute names have a meaning, so try to use the attribute name that matches the type of entry
it represents. For example, do not use l to represent an organization, or c to represent an
organizational unit.
Section 4.2.3.1, "Naming Person Entries"
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Section 4.2.3.2, "Naming Group Entries"
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Section 4.2.3.3, "Naming Organization Entries"
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Section 4.2.3.4, "Naming Other Kinds of Entries"
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4.2.3.1. Naming Person Entries

The person entry's name, the DN, must be unique. Traditionally, distinguished names use the
commonName, or cn, attribute to name their person entries. That is, an entry for a person named Babs
Jensen might have the distinguished name of cn=Babs Jensen, dc=example,dc=com.
While using the common name makes it easier to associated the person with the entry, it might not be
unique enough to exclude people with identical names. This quickly leads to a problem known as DN
name collisions, multiple entries with the same distinguished name.
Avoid common name collisions by adding a unique identifier to the common name, such as cn=Babs
Jensen+employeeNumber=23,dc=example,dc=com.
However, this can lead to awkward common names for large directories and can be difficult to
maintain.
A better method is to identify the person entries with some attribute other than cn. Consider using one
of the following attributes:
• uid
Use the uid attribute to specify some unique value of the person. Possibilities include a user login
ID or an employee number. A subscriber in a hosting environment should be identified by the uid
attribute.
• mail
Use the mail attribute to contain the value for the person's email address. This option can lead to
awkward DNs that include duplicate attribute values (for example: mail=bjensen@example.com,
dc=example, dc=com), so use this option only if there is not some other unique value to use with
the uid attribute. For example, use the mail attribute instead of the uid attribute if the enterprise
does not assign employee numbers or user IDs for temporary or contract employees.
• employeeNumber
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