"The Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) is the Internet standard for directory services. Perl provides one of the best tools you can use to
build LDAP-based applications. In this article we're going to learn how to use Perl to search LDAP servers."
"A directory service is specialized database that has been optimized for read access. The data that is contained in a directory service is usually the type of
data that is accessed more often than it's updated (things like password databases, DNS tables, etc). A directory is usually organized in a hierarchical
fashion as opposed to a relational format. Finally a directory service generally is designed so that it can be easily distributed across different servers."
"Directory services provide us with the ability to provide all sorts of services such as a network email address book, ability to provide single sign-on or
manage networked devices like printers."
