Re: Empty Directory String - is it legal?

["Kurt D. Zeilenga" <Kurt@OpenLDAP.org>]

At 10:03 PM 9/25/00 -0400, Brent Baccala wrote:
>Hi -
>
>I'm trying to get Microsoft NetMeeting working with openldap, and I've
>pretty much done it (using the shell backend), but I've still got a few
>linguring issues.  I need to create a schema and don't have Microsoft's
>definitions.

There are some Microsoft schema files in our development tree...

>Two of the attributes (comment and location) can be left
>blank, in which case the client will send them to the server with a
>zero-length value.  I've tried using Directory String for the syntax,
>but the server barks at the zero-length values.  So...
>
>1. should Directory String take zero-length values?

No.  Directory Strings must not be empty.

>There's nothing in RFC 2252 to suggest that it shouldn't.

See X.500.

>2. should I use Octet String instead?  The app never does searches
>against this attribute

The schema specifications I've seen for 'comment' and 'location'
are syntax directoryString.  I wouldn't muck with these as they
are likely have far wider use then Net Meeting...

>3. should there be a server option to turn off the rigid syntax checking
>and just make these things warnings instead?  

IMO, no.