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IETF RFC 4518
Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP): Internationalized String Preparation
Last modified on Wednesday, June 7th, 2006
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Network Working Group K. Zeilenga
Request for Comments: 4518 OpenLDAP Foundation
Category: Standards Track June 2006
Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP):
Internationalized String Preparation
 Status of This Memo
This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the
Internet community, and requests discussion and suggestions for
improvements. Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet
Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state
and status of this protocol. Distribution of this memo is unlimited.
Copyright Notice
Copyright © The Internet Society (2006).
Abstract
The previous Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) technical
specifications did not precisely define how character string matching
is to be performed. This led to a number of usability and
interoperability problems. This document defines string preparation
algorithms for character-based matching rules defined for use in
LDAP.
1. Introduction
1.1. Background
A Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) [RFC 4510] matching
rule [RFC 4517] defines an algorithm for determining whether a
presented value matches an attribute value in accordance with the
criteria defined for the rule. The proposition may be evaluated to
True, False, or Undefined.
True - the attribute contains a matching value,
False - the attribute contains no matching value,
Undefined - it cannot be determined whether the attribute contains
a matching value.
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RFC 4518 LDAP: Internationalized String Preparation June 2006
For instance, the caseIgnoreMatch matching rule may be used to
compare whether the commonName attribute contains a particular value
without regard for case and insignificant spaces.
1.2. X.500 String Matching Rules
"X.520: Selected attribute types" [X.520] provides (among other
things) value syntaxes and matching rules for comparing values
commonly used in the directory [X.500]. These specifications are
inadequate for strings composed of Unicode [Unicode] characters.
The caseIgnoreMatch matching rule [X.520], for example, is simply
defined as being a case-insensitive comparison where insignificant
spaces are ignored. For printableString, there is only one space
character and case mapping is bijective, hence this definition is
sufficient. However, for Unicode string types such as
universalString, this is not sufficient. For example, a case-
insensitive matching implementation that folded lowercase characters
to uppercase would yield different results than an implementation
that used uppercase to lowercase folding. Or one implementation may
view space as referring to only SPACE (U+0020), a second
implementation may view any character with the space separator (Zs)
property as a space, and another implementation may view any
character with the whitespace (WS) category as a space.
The lack of precise specification for character string matching has
led to significant interoperability problems. When used in
certificate chain validation, security vulnerabilities can arise. To
address these problems, this document defines precise algorithms for
preparing character strings for matching.
1.3. Relationship to "stringprep"
The character string preparation algorithms described in this
document are based upon the "stringprep" approach [RFC 3454]. In
"stringprep", presented and stored values are first prepared for
comparison so that a character-by-character comparison yields the
"correct" result.
The approach used here is a refinement of the "stringprep" [RFC 3454]
approach. Each algorithm involves two additional preparation steps.
a) Prior to applying the Unicode string preparation steps outlined in
"stringprep", the string is transcoded to Unicode.
b) After applying the Unicode string preparation steps outlined in
"stringprep", the string is modified to appropriately handle
characters insignificant to the matching rule.
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RFC 4518 LDAP: Internationalized String Preparation June 2006
Hence, preparation of character strings for X.500 [X.500] matching
[X.501] involves the following steps:
1) Transcode
2) Map
3) Normalize
4) Prohibit
5) Check Bidi (Bidirectional)
6) Insignificant Character Handling
These steps are described in Section 2.
It is noted that while various tables of Unicode characters included
or referenced by this specification are derived from Unicode
[Unicode] data, these tables are to be considered definitive for the
purpose of implementing this specification.
1.4. Relationship to the LDAP Technical Specification
This document is an integral part of the LDAP technical specification
[RFC 4510], which obsoletes the previously defined LDAP technical
specification [RFC 3377] in its entirety.
This document details new LDAP internationalized character string
preparation algorithms used by [RFC 4517] and possible other technical
specifications defining LDAP syntaxes and/or matching rules.
1.5. Relationship to X.500
LDAP is defined [RFC 4510] in X.500 terms as an X.500 access
mechanism. As such, there is a strong desire for alignment between
LDAP and X.500 syntax and semantics. The character string
preparation algorithms described in this document are based upon
"Internationalized String Matching Rules for X.500" [XMATCH] proposal
to ITU/ISO Joint Study Group 2.
1.6. Conventions and Terms
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
document are to be interpreted as described in BCP 14 [RFC 2119].
Character names in this document use the notation for code points and
names from the Unicode Standard [Unicode]. For example, the letter
"a" may be represented as either <U+0061> or <LATIN SMALL LETTER A>.
In the lists of mappings and the prohibited characters, the "U+" is
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RFC 4518 LDAP: Internationalized String Preparation June 2006
left off to make the lists easier to read. The comments for
character ranges are shown in square brackets (such as "[CONTROL
CHARACTERS]") and do not come from the standard.
Note: a glossary of terms used in Unicode can be found in [Glossary].
Information on the Unicode character encoding model can be found in
[CharModel].
The term "combining mark", as used in this specification, refers to
any Unicode [Unicode] code point that has a mark property (Mn, Mc,
Me). Appendix A provides a definitive list of combining marks.
2. String Preparation
The following six-step process SHALL be applied to each presented and
attribute value in preparation for character string matching rule
evaluation.
1) Transcode
2) Map
3) Normalize
4) Prohibit
5) Check bidi
6) Insignificant Character Handling
Failure in any step causes the assertion to evaluate to Undefined.
The character repertoire of this process is Unicode 3.2 [Unicode].
Note that this six-step process specification is intended to describe
expected matching behavior. Implementations are free to use
alternative processes so long as the matching rule evaluation
behavior provided is consistent with the behavior described by this
specification.
2.1. Transcode
Each non-Unicode string value is transcoded to Unicode.
PrintableString [X.680] values are transcoded directly to Unicode.
UniversalString, UTF8String, and bmpString [X.680] values need not be
transcoded as they are Unicode-based strings (in the case of
bmpString, a subset of Unicode).
TeletexString [X.680] values are transcoded to Unicode. As there is
no standard for mapping TeletexString values to Unicode, the mapping
is left a local matter.
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For these and other reasons, use of TeletexString is NOT RECOMMENDED.
The output is the transcoded string.
2.2. Map
SOFT HYPHEN (U+00AD) and MONGOLIAN TODO SOFT HYPHEN (U+1806) code
points are mapped to nothing. COMBINING GRAPHEME JOINER (U+034F) and
VARIATION SELECTORs (U+180B-180D, FF00-FE0F) code points are also
mapped to nothing. The OBJECT REPLACEMENT CHARACTER (U+FFFC) is
mapped to nothing.
CHARACTER TABULATION (U+0009), LINE FEED (LF) (U+000A), LINE
TABULATION (U+000B), FORM FEED (FF) (U+000C), CARRIAGE RETURN (CR)
(U+000D), and NEXT LINE (NEL) (U+0085) are mapped to SPACE (U+0020).
All other control code (e.g., Cc) points or code points with a
control function (e.g., Cf) are mapped to nothing. The following is
a complete list of these code points: U+0000-0008, 000E-001F, 007F-
0084, 0086-009F, 06DD, 070F, 180E, 200C-200F, 202A-202E, 2060-2063,
206A-206F, FEFF, FFF9-FFFB, 1D173-1D17A, E0001, E0020-E007F.
ZERO WIDTH SPACE (U+200B) is mapped to nothing. All other code
points with Separator (space, line, or paragraph) property (e.g., Zs,
Zl, or Zp) are mapped to SPACE (U+0020). The following is a complete
list of these code points: U+0020, 00A0, 1680, 2000-200A, 2028-2029,
202F, 205F, 3000.
For case ignore, numeric, and stored prefix string matching rules,
characters are case folded per B.2 of [RFC 3454].
The output is the mapped string.
2.3. Normalize
The input string is to be normalized to Unicode Form KC
(compatibility composed) as described in [UAX15]. The output is the
normalized string.
2.4. Prohibit
All Unassigned code points are prohibited. Unassigned code points
are listed in Table A.1 of [RFC 3454].
Characters that, per Section 5.8 of [RFC 3454], change display
properties or are deprecated are prohibited. These characters are
listed in Table C.8 of [RFC 3454].
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Private Use code points are prohibited. These characters are listed
in Table C.3 of [RFC 3454].
All non-character code points are prohibited. These code points are
listed in Table C.4 of [RFC 3454].
Surrogate codes are prohibited. These characters are listed in Table
C.5 of [RFC 3454].
The REPLACEMENT CHARACTER (U+FFFD) code point is prohibited.
The step fails if the input string contains any prohibited code
point. Otherwise, the output is the input string.
2.5. Check bidi
Bidirectional characters are ignored.
2.6. Insignificant Character Handling
In this step, the string is modified to ensure proper handling of
characters insignificant to the matching rule. This modification
differs from matching rule to matching rule.
Section 2.6.1 applies to case ignore and exact string matching.
Section 2.6.2 applies to numericString matching.
Section 2.6.3 applies to telephoneNumber matching.
2.6.1. Insignificant Space Handling
For the purposes of this section, a space is defined to be the SPACE
(U+0020) code point followed by no combining marks.
NOTE - The previous steps ensure that the string cannot contain
any code points in the separator class, other than SPACE
(U+0020).
For input strings that are attribute values or non-substring
assertion values: If the input string contains no non-space
character, then the output is exactly two SPACEs. Otherwise (the
input string contains at least one non-space character), the string
is modified such that the string starts with exactly one space
character, ends with exactly one SPACE character, and any inner
(non-empty) sequence of space characters is replaced with exactly two
SPACE characters. For instance, the input strings
"foo<SPACE>bar<SPACE><SPACE>", result in the output
"<SPACE>foo<SPACE><SPACE>bar<SPACE>".
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For input strings that are substring assertion values: If the string
being prepared contains no non-space characters, then the output
string is exactly one SPACE. Otherwise, the following steps are
taken:
- If the input string is an initial substring, it is modified to
start with exactly one SPACE character;
- If the input string is an initial or an any substring that ends in
one or more space characters, it is modified to end with exactly
one SPACE character;
- If the input string is an any or a final substring that starts in
one or more space characters, it is modified to start with exactly
one SPACE character; and
- If the input string is a final substring, it is modified to end
with exactly one SPACE character.
For instance, for the input string "foo<SPACE>bar<SPACE><SPACE>" as
an initial substring, the output would be
"<SPACE>foo<SPACE><SPACE>bar<SPACE>". As an any or final substring,
the same input would result in "foo<SPACE>bar<SPACE>".
Appendix B discusses the rationale for the behavior.
2.6.2. numericString Insignificant Character Handling
For the purposes of this section, a space is defined to be the SPACE
(U+0020) code point followed by no combining marks.
All spaces are regarded as insignificant and are to be removed.
For example, removal of spaces from the Form KC string:
"<SPACE><SPACE>123<SPACE><SPACE>456<SPACE><SPACE>"
would result in the output string:
"123456"
and the Form KC string:
"<SPACE><SPACE><SPACE>"
would result in the output string:
"" (an empty string).
2.6.3. telephoneNumber Insignificant Character Handling
For the purposes of this section, a hyphen is defined to be a
HYPHEN-MINUS (U+002D), ARMENIAN HYPHEN (U+058A), HYPHEN (U+2010),
NON-BREAKING HYPHEN (U+2011), MINUS SIGN (U+2212), SMALL HYPHEN-MINUS
(U+FE63), or FULLWIDTH HYPHEN-MINUS (U+FF0D) code point followed by
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RFC 4518 LDAP: Internationalized String Preparation June 2006
no combining marks and a space is defined to be the SPACE (U+0020)
code point followed by no combining marks.
All hyphens and spaces are considered insignificant and are to be
removed.
For example, removal of hyphens and spaces from the Form KC string:
"<SPACE><HYPHEN>123<SPACE><SPACE>456<SPACE><HYPHEN>"
would result in the output string:
"123456"
and the Form KC string:
"<HYPHEN><HYPHEN><HYPHEN>"
would result in the (empty) output string:
"".
3. Security Considerations
"Preparation of Internationalized Strings ("stringprep")" [RFC 3454]
security considerations generally apply to the algorithms described
here.
4. Acknowledgements
The approach used in this document is based upon design principles
and algorithms described in "Preparation of Internationalized Strings
('stringprep')" [RFC 3454] by Paul Hoffman and Marc Blanchet. Some
additional guidance was drawn from Unicode Technical Standards,
Technical Reports, and Notes.
This document is a product of the IETF LDAP Revision (LDAPBIS)
Working Group.
5. References
5.1. Normative References
[RFC 2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
[RFC 3454] Hoffman, P. and M. Blanchet, "Preparation of
Internationalized Strings ("stringprep")", RFC 3454,
December 2002.
[RFC 4510] Zeilenga, K., "Lightweight Directory Access Protocol
(LDAP): Technical Specification Road Map", RFC 4510,
June 2006.
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RFC 4518 LDAP: Internationalized String Preparation June 2006
[RFC 4517] Legg, S., Ed., "Lightweight Directory Access Protocol
(LDAP): Syntaxes and Matching Rules", RFC 4517, June
2006.
[Unicode] The Unicode Consortium, "The Unicode Standard, Version
3.2.0" is defined by "The Unicode Standard, Version
3.0" (Reading, MA, Addison-Wesley, 2000. ISBN 0-201-
61633-5), as amended by the "Unicode Standard Annex
#27: Unicode 3.1"
(http://www.unicode.org/reports/tr27/) and by the
"Unicode Standard Annex #28: Unicode 3.2"
(http://www.unicode.org/reports/tr28/).
[UAX15] Davis, M. and M. Duerst, "Unicode Standard Annex #15:
Unicode Normalization Forms, Version 3.2.0".
<http://www.unicode.org/unicode/reports/tr15/tr15-
22.html>, March 2002.
[X.680] International Telecommunication Union -
Telecommunication Standardization Sector, "Abstract
Syntax Notation One (ASN.1) - Specification of Basic
Notation", X.680(2002) (also ISO/IEC 8824-1:2002).
5.2. Informative References
[X.500] International Telecommunication Union -
Telecommunication Standardization Sector, "The
Directory -- Overview of concepts, models and
services," X.500(1993) (also ISO/IEC 9594-1:1994).
[X.501] International Telecommunication Union -
Telecommunication Standardization Sector, "The
Directory -- Models," X.501(1993) (also ISO/IEC 9594-
2:1994).
[X.520] International Telecommunication Union -
Telecommunication Standardization Sector, "The
Directory: Selected Attribute Types", X.520(1993) (also
ISO/IEC 9594-6:1994).
[Glossary] The Unicode Consortium, "Unicode Glossary",
<http://www.unicode.org/glossary/>.
[CharModel] Whistler, K. and M. Davis, "Unicode Technical Report
#17, Character Encoding Model", UTR17,
<http://www.unicode.org/unicode/reports/tr17/>, August
2000.
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RFC 4518 LDAP: Internationalized String Preparation June 2006
[RFC 3377] Hodges, J. and R. Morgan, "Lightweight Directory Access
Protocol (v3): Technical Specification", RFC 3377,
September 2002.
[RFC 4515] Smith, M., Ed. and T. Howes, "Lightweight Directory
Access Protocol (LDAP): String Representation of Search
Filters", RFC 4515, June 2006.
[XMATCH] Zeilenga, K., "Internationalized String Matching Rules
for X.500", Work in Progress.
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Appendix A. Combining Marks
This appendix is normative.
This table was derived from Unicode [Unicode] data files; it lists
all code points with the Mn, Mc, or Me properties. This table is to
be considered definitive for the purposes of implementation of this
specification.
0300-034F 0360-036F 0483-0486 0488-0489 0591-05A1
05A3-05B9 05BB-05BC 05BF 05C1-05C2 05C4 064B-0655 0670
06D6-06DC 06DE-06E4 06E7-06E8 06EA-06ED 0711 0730-074A
07A6-07B0 0901-0903 093C 093E-094F 0951-0954 0962-0963
0981-0983 09BC 09BE-09C4 09C7-09C8 09CB-09CD 09D7
09E2-09E3 0A02 0A3C 0A3E-0A42 0A47-0A48 0A4B-0A4D
0A70-0A71 0A81-0A83 0ABC 0ABE-0AC5 0AC7-0AC9 0ACB-0ACD
0B01-0B03 0B3C 0B3E-0B43 0B47-0B48 0B4B-0B4D 0B56-0B57
0B82 0BBE-0BC2 0BC6-0BC8 0BCA-0BCD 0BD7 0C01-0C03
0C3E-0C44 0C46-0C48 0C4A-0C4D 0C55-0C56 0C82-0C83
0CBE-0CC4 0CC6-0CC8 0CCA-0CCD 0CD5-0CD6 0D02-0D03
0D3E-0D43 0D46-0D48 0D4A-0D4D 0D57 0D82-0D83 0DCA
0DCF-0DD4 0DD6 0DD8-0DDF 0DF2-0DF3 0E31 0E34-0E3A
0E47-0E4E 0EB1 0EB4-0EB9 0EBB-0EBC 0EC8-0ECD 0F18-0F19
0F35 0F37 0F39 0F3E-0F3F 0F71-0F84 0F86-0F87 0F90-0F97
0F99-0FBC 0FC6 102C-1032 1036-1039 1056-1059 1712-1714
1732-1734 1752-1753 1772-1773 17B4-17D3 180B-180D 18A9
20D0-20EA 302A-302F 3099-309A FB1E FE00-FE0F FE20-FE23
1D165-1D169 1D16D-1D172 1D17B-1D182 1D185-1D18B
1D1AA-1D1AD
Appendix B. Substrings Matching
This appendix is non-normative.
In the absence of substrings matching, the insignificant space
handling for case ignore/exact matching could be simplified.
Specifically, the handling could be to require that all sequences of
one or more spaces be replaced with one space and, if the string
contains non-space characters, removal of all leading spaces and
trailing spaces.
In the presence of substrings matching, this simplified space
handling would lead to unexpected and undesirable matching behavior.
For instance:
1) (CN=foo\20*\20bar) would match the CN value "foobar";
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RFC 4518 LDAP: Internationalized String Preparation June 2006
2) (CN=*\20foobar\20*) would match "foobar", but
(CN=*\20*foobar*\20*) would not.
Note to readers not familiar with LDAP substrings matching: the LDAP
filter [RFC 4515] assertion (CN=A*B*C) says to "match any value (of
the attribute CN) that begins with A, contains B after A, ends with C
where C is also after B."
The first case illustrates that this simplified space handling would
cause leading and trailing spaces in substrings of the string to be
regarded as insignificant. However, only leading and trailing (as
well as multiple consecutive spaces) of the string (as a whole) are
insignificant.
The second case illustrates that this simplified space handling would
cause sub-partitioning failures. That is, if a prepared any
substring matches a partition of the attribute value, then an
assertion constructed by subdividing that substring into multiple
substrings should also match.
In designing an appropriate approach for space handling for
substrings matching, one must study key aspects of X.500 case
exact/ignore matching. X.520 [X.520] says:
The [substrings] rule returns TRUE if there is a partitioning of
the attribute value (into portions) such that:
- the specified substrings (initial, any, final) match
different portions of the value in the order of the strings
sequence;
- initial, if present, matches the first portion of the value;
- final, if present, matches the last portion of the value;
- any, if present, matches some arbitrary portion of the
value.
That is, the substrings assertion (CN=foo\20*\20bar) matches the
attribute value "foo<SPACE><SPACE>bar" as the value can be
partitioned into the portions "foo<SPACE>" and "<SPACE>bar" meeting
the above requirements.
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RFC 4518 LDAP: Internationalized String Preparation June 2006
X.520 also says:
[T]he following spaces are regarded as not significant:
- leading spaces (i.e., those preceding the first character
that is not a space);
- trailing spaces (i.e., those following the last character
that is not a space);
- multiple consecutive spaces (these are taken as equivalent
to a single space character).
This statement applies to the assertion values and attribute values
as whole strings, and not individually to substrings of an assertion
value. In particular, the statements should be taken to mean that if
an assertion value and attribute value match without any
consideration to insignificant characters, then that assertion value
should also match any attribute value that differs only by inclusion
nor removal of insignificant characters.
Hence the assertion (CN=foo\20*\20bar) matches
"foo<SPACE><SPACE><SPACE>bar" and "foo<SPACE>bar" as these values
only differ from "foo<SPACE><SPACE>bar" by the inclusion or removal
of insignificant spaces.
Astute readers of this text will also note that there are special
cases where the specified space handling does not ignore spaces that
could be considered insignificant. For instance, the assertion
(CN=\20*\20*\20) does not match "<SPACE><SPACE><SPACE>"
(insignificant spaces present in value) or " " (insignificant spaces
not present in value). However, as these cases have no practical
application that cannot be met by simple assertions, e.g., (cn=\20),
and this minor anomaly can only be fully addressed by a preparation
algorithm to be used in conjunction with character-by-character
partitioning and matching, the anomaly is considered acceptable.
Author's Address
Kurt D. Zeilenga
OpenLDAP Foundation
EMail: Kurt@OpenLDAP.org
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RFC 4518 LDAP: Internationalized String Preparation June 2006
Full Copyright Statement
Copyright © The Internet Society (2006).
This document is subject to the rights, licenses and restrictions
contained in BCP 78, and except as set forth therein, the authors
retain all their rights.
This document and the information contained herein are provided on an
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OR IS SPONSORED BY (IF ANY), THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE INTERNET
ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED,
INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE
INFORMATION HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED
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Acknowledgement
Funding for the RFC Editor function is provided by the IETF
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Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP): Internationalized String Preparation
RFC TOTAL SIZE: 28166 bytes
PUBLICATION DATE: Wednesday, June 7th, 2006
LEGAL RIGHTS: The IETF Trust (see BCP 78)
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