The behavior you describe violates RFC 4512 (section 5.1), while OpenLDAP
complies with it. Please note that the root DSE is accessed using a
plain, perfectly legal LDAP operation. The fact a client cannot be
configured to perform such a simple operation clearly indicates the client
is broken. A quick answer would be "get the client fixed".
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I can imagine simple workarounds, consisting in few lines of code that
allow to circumvent the issue. They probably require to hire some expert
consultant.
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p.