LDIF Files In LDAP Data Interchange File Format
It is basically a text data file, which allows to share data between different directory servers or applications. It maintains directory records for a particular service. Moreover, it can also be used to share the information between different email clients by allowing them to save the required contact information in LDIF format. Thus, it provides a medium to export the data and migrate to another email application without any data loss by easily knowing what is LDIF file format.
The common fields enclosed within a LDIF file address book include:
application/octet-stream
LDAP Data interchange format file contains the data in the form of multiple entries, which are separated by a blank line. Every entry in the LDAP file contains the following attributes:
The general structure of LDIF format can be represented as:
Thus, some points that can be deduced about What is LDIF file & what it includes:
The LDIF files, being a common interchange format for holding records can be widely used in different domains:
1. LDIF files are associated with LDAP servers, which maintain the structure of contacts in an organized manner. Each record is specified as a field that can be accessed to get detailed information about a particular record. Thus, LDIF files contains a detailed information corresponding to LDAP directory.
Users can choose to export records within LDAP servers by saving them into LDIF file format. One can save complete or required part of directory as LDIF files by the following steps:
The generated LDIF files contains the records from the selected directory.
2. As stated earlier too, many email clients such as Thunderbird support to export Personal Address Books and collected address books as LDIF. Thus, while migrating to another email application users prefer to save the existing contacts as LDIF file format.
The LDIF files cannot be directly opened by the operating system. If an attempt is made to access LDIF file, it generates an error message: “Cannot open this file”. Thus, users are suggested to go for LDIF Viewer tool, to access records from the selected LDIF file.
General Queries About What Is LDIF (Data Interchange File Format)
The LDIF files do not have any limitation on the number of records to be saved. It contains a set of all the records from a particular directory.
Yes, you can import LDIF files to Thunderbird in the following steps:
Yes, the LDIF contains all the records with complete attributes.
You must try LDIF converter tool, which lets you access all records from the LDIF files.