Could LDAP be the next killer DAP?

About a year ago, Netscape Communications, with the support of more than 40 other companies, adopted the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP). Notably absent from the list of early LDAP supporters, Microsoft came on board eight months later. LDAP is a protocol that allows a program such as a browser or an e-mail package to perform directory lookups across a wide variety of directories, even if they run on different operating systems and directory environments. For example, LDAP could search the internal corporate directory stored on a corporate server or a publicly available directory. In some ways, LDAP itself is not the critical element. A protocol alone is not enough. What´s missing is a useful set of directory servers that support LDAP and client software that conveniently queries those servers using LDAP. Well, as it turns out both of those things do exist. In Netscape Navigator 4.0, simply go to Edit I Search Directory, select the proper directory service, type in a person´s name, press Search and voila-you get a short list of the people who might match the name in question. From the interface, you are now two clicks away from sending an e-mail message to that person. Now that is a killer DAP-it´s clearly obvious just how useful this feature will be