[sllug-members]: email/pim wanted

[Dave Smith]

Robert Lewis wrote:
> Thunderbird cannot do this.
>   

Thunderbird *can* do this if you create an LDAP directory that 
Thunderbird can use.

LDAP is hierarchical. Your example directory would look like this:

dc=example,dc=org
    ou=People
        ou=Friends
            cn=Joe Friendly
            cn=Bob Neighbor
        ou=Family
            cn=Bob Barker
            cn=Jack Bauer
        ou=League
            ou=Vendors
                cn=Hotdogs Unlimited
                cn=Snow Cones R Us
            ou=Teams
                cn=Cardinals
                    ou=Coaches
                        cn=Bob Smith
                        cn=Joe Johnson
                    ou=Players
                        cn=Freddy Fredrickson
                        cn=Dave Johnson
                        ...

By doing a search on ou=People,dc=example,dc=org, you can find 
*everyone* in the directory. But if you just search under 
cn=Cardinals,ou=Teams,ou=League,ou=People,dc=example,dc=org, you will 
get coaches and players for the Cardinals team.

In LDAP, you do can create references (like sym-links), where you can 
put references to people in different containers. phpLDAPadmin can do 
all of this for you in a more-or-less easy web interface. I recommend 
the latest stable OpenLDAP (2.3.something) with the bdb (Berkeley DB) 
backend.

Good luck!

--Dave