I've been trying to research how to correctly escape search filters, and I can't find any single reliable source that makes sense.

I look at RFC 2253 (http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2253.txt) section 2.4, and this IBM webpage ( http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/iseries/v5r3/index.jsp?topic=/rzahy... ), and they both seem to suggest that you need to escape (for example) the '+' sign.

But when I escape a search filter like this: (&(objectclass=person)(facsimileTelephoneNumber=+1234)) to this: (&(objectclass=person)(facsimileTelephoneNumber=+1234)) it results in a bad filter.

My hunch is that perhaps DNs, attribute names, and attribute values are all escaped different.

Is there a simple explanation online on how to escape search filters?

Thanks, - Jeremiah