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Editing Multiple Directory Objects

LEX allows you to edit and change the attributes of more than one object at one fell swoop. There are no restrictions regarding the count of objects which can be changed simultaneously. You must have to select more than one object in the object list and press ALT-ENTER - or use the menu option Connection - Attributes:

Edit Multiple Objects window

You see the Edit Multiple Objects dialog, where you can set all the attributes which you want to be written to all the objects which are listed in the Objects: text list.

Please note that you don't see the current values for attributes of the regarding objects. This dialog can only write new and additional attributes to all the objects which are listed here. The current values can be overwritten by the new values or merged with them (read more information in the next paragraphs).

Editing in the Edit Multiple Objects Dialog


If you want to set a value in attribute list for the selected objects, you can do this exactly if you would edit an attribute in one of the other attribute lists of LEX:

  • You can use the F2 key to quick-edit the value. If no in-place edit box can be opened, you will see a normal editor dialog for the attribute value.

  • You can press ENTER to open the standard editor dialog for the attribute value. LEX comes with quite a lot of different editors for the attribute syntaxes - the correct one is chosen automatically.

  • Both functions are also available if you use the context menu in the attribute list (right mouse click).

If an attribute line is empty in the list, LEX does not touch this attribute for the selected objects.

If you want an attribute to be deleted for all the selected objects, than you have to use the context menu (right mouse click) option Erase attribute on all objs. If you do this, the regarding attribute line is marked to indicate this fact:

Erase attribute on multiple objects

Setting/Removing single bits in multiedit mode


Whenever you opened an integer or flag attribute editor in the multiple objects mode, then you can choose if you want to write the actual value, or if just the activated bits are to be set or to be removed from the regarding attribute of all the objects:

Setting and removing single bits

If you chose to just set/remove single bits, then this is indicated in the multiple object editor attribute list:

Setting and removing single bits



References to existing Attributes


One of the most interesting feature of the Multiple Objects Edit dialog is the ability to set values based on existing attributes. You can reference other attributes. Just set them in %....% signs just like you may be familiar with from the DOS command line or batch files.

If you want to set the display name or email address to be based on an existing given name and surname, you could set the regarding value to

%sn%, %givenName%

Setting attribtues with references

If some of the selected objects doesn't have the referenced attribute values, then an empty string is used for the new value at the regarding attribute.

Write the Values to the Directory


If you have set all the attribute values that you wish to be written to the selected objects, you can press the OK button. LEX have two choices now: The new attributes overwrite the old values, or they can be merged to the existing values:

Replacing or merging the old attributes

Please note that this behavior is only possible if the regarding attributes are multi valued. For single valued attributes, there always can be only one value - so the old value is overwritten here. LEX examines the set of attributes you want to write in the Edit Multiple Objects dialog.


Command Buttons in the Edit Multiple Objects Dialog

Add new attribute button The Add new attribute button adds a new attribute value to the new object. Normally all the objects attribute should be shown automatically based on the schema information.

Add attribute element to an array button The Add attribute element to an array button can add a new value to an multi valued attribute. You cannot use this button if you have selected a single valued attribute.

Remove attribute button The Remove attribute button deletes an existing attribute value from the new object.

Show friendly object names button The Show friendly object names button creates a user-friendly output of names.

Show distinguished name in Novell notation button The Show distinguished name in Novell notation button shows the names in Novell's dotted notation.

Show hex output for attribute with hex values button The Show hex output for attribute with hex values button toggles the display for attributes which data type has binary character (hex values / octetstring values). This refers to the object list as well as to the attribute list. The values are shown as their hexadecimal values OR as their corresponding ASCII characters.

Show multivalued attributes The Show multivalued attributes button toggles the display for attributes which contains an array of values. Normally such multi valued attributes are displayed condensed
Multivalued attributes condensed display
If you choose to show all such attributes with all values, activate the button and the display changes to
Multivalued attributes full display
Please note that there is a quick and easy way to switch the multi valued display for one single attribute in the list: Just press the SPACE key on your keyboard or use the context menu (right mouse click) and the option Show Multivalue as Array / Show Multivalue as Singe Line.