I still consider myself a newbie despite having many small businesses runing linux systems I've installed. I've exhausted my resources on this one and could really use some help here.

Problem:
- "getent passwd" will not show LDAP entries

Premise:
- LDAP is functioning properly. I've been using it with many tools (gq, ldapbrowser, and phpldapadmin) and multiple applications (postfix, samba) for nearly a year.
- test user "jdoe" is ONLY in the LDAP directory
- Logged in as "root" on server
- SUSE 9.2

Focus:
- PAM or nsswitch

Fuel:
- getent passwd jdoe .... RETURNS NOTHING
- getent passwd .... ONLY RETURNS local entries
- ldapsearch -H ldap://ldap.abc.com -x -D "uid=admins,ou=people,o=abc" -y "/etc/ldap.secret" "uid=jdoe" ... WORKS!
- ldapsearch -H ldap://ldap.abc.com -x -W "uid=jdoe" ... RETURNS NOTHING!

Questions:
Why does the log of above "failed" commands indicate bind attempted as DN=""?
Shouldn't the linux "root" user map to the 'rootbinddn' in '/etc/ldap.conf'?
What can I do to "isolate" the cause of the problem?
What can I provide so that you might assist me better?