Netscape DIRECTORY SERVER 6.2 - PLUG-IN Manual page 22

How Directory Server Plug-Ins Work
The front-end receives LDAP requests from clients and processes those requests.
When processing requests, the front-end calls functions in the back-end to read and
write data. The front-end then sends the results back to the client.
The back-end reads and writes data to the database containing the directory entries.
The back-end abstracts the database from the front-end. The data stored in a
back-end is identified by the suffixes that the back-end supports. For example, a
back-end that supports the "o=example.com" suffix contains directory entries that
end with that suffix.
Figure 1-1 illustrates the Directory Server architecture.
22 Netscape Directory Server Plug-In Programmer's Guide • December 2003