Hi all,

my questions below are more about openldap pragmatics than technical issues; if 
they are off-topic, please point me somewhere else to ask.  As I'm a newbie, 
please bear with me, if I get things completely wrong.

What I want to achieve using slapd:

a) A centralised authentication service for system accounts of a handful of 
Linux hosts (libpam-ldapd) and some apache-based webapps (mod_authnz_ldap).
b) Every user has a single password stored in exactly one place in the DIT 
(single-sign on is not topical in my environment).
c) I would like to have fine-grained control over whether an ldap user has 
access to a specific host or webapp or not.


Based on that I have got two questions:

1. DIT organisation

Let's assume my suffix is dc=foo.  I plan to have ou=Users,dc=foo for storing 
ldap users with their (unique) passwords and ou=Services,dc=foo to have account 
information for each of my services; e.g. ou=host1,ou=services,dc=foo to 
provide posix account information for host1, or ou=webapp1,ou=services,dc=foo 
for mod_authnz_ldap related information regarding webapp1 etc.  I plan to use 
olcAuthzRegexp to authenticate users below ou=host1,ou=services,dc=foo or 
ou=webapp1,ou=services,dc=foo against ldap users in ou=Users,dc=foo.  Is this a 
sensible setup or are there better hierarchies to achieve my goals?

2. Password storage policy

(NB: I am using TLS with a self-signed certificate.)  Theoretically I would 
prefer to store hashed passwords.  If I understand correctly, olcAuthRegexp 
only works with SASL and hashed passwords can only possibly work with the PLAIN 
mechanism (??).  So I tried that and simple binding works as expected, when 
directly binding to an entry with an attribute "userPassword" (i.e. without 
indirection through olcAuthzRegexp).  To get SASL/PLAIN working, I have tried 
(without success up till now) to use saslauthd.  Moreover the authentication 
path "client -> TLS/TCP/IP -> slapd (SASL/PLAIN) -> Unix Domain socket -> 
saslauthd -> localhost/TCP/IP -> slapd (simple bind)" seems a little over the 
top for my use case.  So I am wondering, if hashed password storage is really 
such a good idea.  What are the (security) implications of cleartext storage of 
passwords?  Do you have document links discussing this in some depth?


Thanks in advance ...

Mit freundlichen Grüßen / With kind regards / Cordiali saluti,

Andreas




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