RFC 1485 (rfc1485) - Page 3 of 7

A String Representation of Distinguished Names (OSI-DS 23 (v5))

RFC 1485                  Distinguished Names                  July 1993


   Another name might be:

      CN=Christian Huitema, O=INRIA, C=FR

   Semicolon (";") may be used as an alternate separator.

      CN=Christian Huitema; O=INRIA; C=FR

   In running text, this would be written as .  Another example, shows how different attribute types
   are handled:

      CN=James Hacker,
      L=Basingstoke,
      O=Widget Inc,
      CN=GB

   Here is an example of a multi-valued Relative Distinguished Name,
   where the namespace is flat within an organisation, and department is
   used to disambiguate certain names:

      OU=Sales + CN=J. Smith, O=Widget Inc., C=US

   The final example shows quoting of a comma in an Organisation name:

      CN=L. Eagle, O="Sue, Grabbit and Runn", C=GB

2.3 Formal definition

   A formal definition can now be given.  The structure is specified in
   a BNF grammar in Figure 1.  This BNF uses the grammar defined in RFC
   822, with the terminals enclosed in  [Cro82].  This definition is
   in an abstract character set, and so may be written in any character
   set supporting the explicitly defined special characters.  The
   quoting mechanism is used for the following cases:

      o  Strings containing ",", "+", "="or """, , "", "#", or ";".

      o  Strings with leading or trailing spaces

      o  Strings containing consecutive spaces

   There is an escape mechanism from the normal user oriented form, so
   that this syntax may be used to print any valid distinguished name.
   This is ugly.  It is expected to be used only in pathological cases.
   There are two parts to this mechanism:




Hardcastle-Kille