Ruby Net::LDAP
Tuesday, 2 May 2006
Posted by austin in: Ruby, trackback
I did something different recently. Back in December 2003, when I had more time than I knew what to do with, I registered the net-ldap project on RubyForge. I thought I had a need for LDAP, but as I delved into it, I found that I had needs more interesting and more pressing. LDAP is ugly. I’m not sure I want to understand LDAP.
So, a month ago, I put a call out for a developer for the Net::LDAP project. I had a couple of bites, but Francis Cianfrocca had the experience and drive that I was looking for as someone to ultimately hand the project to for development. Francis has exceeded my wildest dreams. He is a firm believer in the idea that API matters, and that a pure-Ruby implementation is of prime importance here.
He’s going as far as to suggest a pure-Ruby server implementation like WEBrick for LDAP details. More than that, he’s got a C++/Ruby library that he’s intent on making possible to use if it’s available on the user’s system, for performance reasons, but will still work well without it. If you use LDAP, or you think you might want to use LDAP, pay attention to this project. Francis is looking at the idea that people don’t get LDAP and trying to abstract the nastiness away. And that’s a good thing.
I wholeheartedly endorse the work that he’s doing now, and while there’s a long way to go, this is a project to watch.
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