OpenLDAP with phpLDAPadmin on Ubuntu 24.04

OpenLDAP is the industry standard open source directory server, the slapd daemon that stores your users, groups and organisational data and answers LDAP queries for the applications, operating systems and services that authenticate against it. This image pairs it with phpLDAPadmin, the long established web console for administering an LDAP directory, so instead of hand editing LDIF files or working through command line tools your administrators browse the directory as a tree, create and edit entries and attributes against the live schema, import and export LDIF, run searches and manage passwords, all from a browser.

This is a complete self contained directory appliance: OpenLDAP runs on the instance as the directory backend and phpLDAPadmin sits in front of it, so a single virtual machine gives you a working, browsable LDAP directory within minutes of launch. Standing this up by hand means installing and configuring slapd, choosing a directory layout and base DN, applying sensible access control, installing a current PHP runtime and a web server, deploying the administration console and wiring it to the directory, before you have hardened a single password. This image completes all of that for you before first boot. The directory is pre organised with People and Groups containers, an administrator account and a few sample accounts so the tree browser is populated the moment you sign in, and OpenLDAP is bound to the loopback interface so the directory service is never exposed off the instance.

Application stack: OpenLDAP 2.6.10 as the directory server, phpLDAPadmin 2.3.11 as the web administration console, the Apache web server with PHP 8.4, on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS.

On the first boot of your instance, a one shot service generates fresh secrets unique to that instance: the directory administrator password you use to sign in to the web console, the OpenLDAP manager password for command line administration, and the application session encryption key. They are written to a root only file, so no shared or default passwords ship in the image. Every page requires you to sign in first, so the directory is never browsable by an anonymous visitor. Browse to the instance address, sign in as the directory administrator, and start managing accounts.

Compared to free community images, this listing includes 24/7 expert support from cloudimg covering deployment guidance, directory design, base DN planning, account and group management, access control, and OpenLDAP administration. OpenLDAP is distributed under the OpenLDAP Public License and phpLDAPadmin under the GNU General Public License version 2. All product and company names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders. Use of them does not imply any affiliation with or endorsement by them.