Jack Wallen shows you how easy it is to add new users to your OpenLDAP directory using the LDAP Account Manager.
Recently I took you through the process of Deploy OpenLDAP Server on Ubuntu Server 22.04† Following that guide should also give you access to the easy-to-use LDAP Account Manager (LAM), a web-based GUI that greatly simplifies managing your OpenLDAP server.
One thing LAM does is make it much easier to add users to the LDAP directory tree. Instead of having to create user files to import from the command line, which isn’t much of a challenge at first, you can use a point-and-click GUI for the process. Through LAM, you can even create accounts so that they can serve as centralized authorization for desktop users – even Linux desktops.
I want to show you how this is done.
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What you need
All you need is an active copy of OpenLDAP and the LAM administrator credentials. With those two things at the ready, let’s add some users.
Add a group
If you add a user right away, you will be immediately warned to add a group first. To do that, log into LAM and click on the Groups tab (Image A†
Image A
On the Groups tab (Figure B), click New Group.
Figure B
In the resulting window (Figure C), give the new group a name.
Figure C
Since we haven’t added users yet, you can’t add group members yet, so click Save and your new group is ready for users.
Add a new user
Click back on the Users tab and then click on New User. In the next window (Figure D), fill in all relevant information in the Personal tab. The only information required is the last name, but I would recommend adding a first name as well.
Figure D
After you fill in the personal information and the new user logs in to a Linux workstation or server, you may want to click on the Unix tab and customize the username to your liking and select both the primary and additional groups that the user needs has. should belong to (Figure E†
Figure E
On the Unix tab, make sure to click Set Password. If prompted (Figure F), type and verify the new password and click OK.
Figure F
When you’re done, click Save and your user should appear in the Users list (Figure G†
Figure G
And that, my friends, is all there is to adding new users to OpenLDAP, with the help of LAM.
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