Unable to add users to GMS via LDAP provisioning.

  • 7015762
  • 14-Oct-2014
  • 15-Oct-2014

Environment

Novell GroupWise 2014
GroupWise Mobile Server 2.x

Situation

After you installed new GW2014 system or upgraded existing GroupWise system into GW2014 version, you are unable to add users to GMS. LDAP search does not find any newly created GroupWise users.

Resolution

When you want to add a new user in GMS system via LDAP provisioning, LDAP search is looking for eDir user objects with older GroupWise attribute "nGWObjectID". Such attribute is no more present in GW2014, therefore LDAP search does not return any results.
 
GroupWise 2014 does not rely anymore on co-existence with some Directory. This configuration option is now only optional. If you install GW2014 into some exiting eDir tree, it does not extend eDir schema with any new GroupWise attributes. If you associate existing GroupWise account with eDir user object, no extra GroupWise attribute is added to eDir site unlike it was with GW2012 and older versions.
 
A solution for such upgraded or newly installed GroupWise 2014 system  is to set provisioning in GMS into GroupWise. Note, once you set provisioning in GMS into GroupWise, it sets automatically also authentication to GroupWise.
If you wish to use LDAP for authentication of mobile devices, then configure security settings on a PO to use LDAP authentication. Having still LDAP provisioning in GMS configuration is left there only for a backward compatibility with older GroupWise versions.
Using GroupWise provisioning / authentication is also recommended if you want mobile devices to authenticate against Microsoft AD. In GW2014 you can set LDAP authentication pointing into AD. 
 
If you were using a group to control users in GMS via adding or removing users from a membership, you can still do it also with such GroupWise configuration combination. A point is that this group must be now "GroupWise" aware. Therefore if you want to keep existing eDir group, just assign it some account in your GW system. Or use GroupWise native Distribution List as a group.