canonical / canonical/ubuntu-server-documentation

OpenLDAP Install Doc optional step to change suffix leads to confusing and undocumented process.

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Description

The documentation gives an optional step 'Change the instance suffix (optional)' to set the DIT suffix.

However, this process asks the user several questions that are confusing and intimating, and seeming unrelated to the DIT suffix. None of these questions/topics are addressed in this particular document. Googling returns documents from other distros with similar but different questions.

* If you enable this option, no initial configuration or database will be created for you. - Omit OpenLDAP server configuration?
* This seems to be a very poorly worded prompt to continue custom config or use defaults, but I'm not really sure.
* DNS domain name
* Unclear if this anything to actually do with DNS or is just used to construct a baseDN.
* Organization name
* Seems to be asking the same as the previous but without reference to DNS. Unclear what this is actually used for.
* Admin password
* Do you want the database to be removed when slapd is purged.
* This string deserves hall-of-shame treatment. It is utterly baffling and leaves the user with a feeling that the wrong choice will lead to doom.
* Move old database?
* Nearly as bad as the previous. Is this a confirmation step? User has no idea how to answer this without more info.

After completing this process, the tool gives no summary of what it did in most cases What's the actual baseDN it constructed? Did it create a new db? Is all my old data gone? Did it do anything at all?

Improvements to the tool text would be very helpful, but documentation covering this process would help until then.

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*Reported from: https://documentation.ubuntu.com/server/how-to/openldap/install-openldap/*

Contributor guide

No contributing guide indexed for this repository

Research direction

Start with the OpenLDAP installation page linked in the report and trace the optional suffix step and its slapd prompts. Document what each prompt changes, including the constructed baseDN, database handling, and resulting configuration; done means a newcomer can complete the process and verify its outcome.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
ubuntu
Domain
documentation
Issue type
Documentation
Difficulty
3/5
Estimated time
1-2 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
45/100

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