I have a set of information about customer environments (as a contractor providing services), and I need to create something to keep track of each customer's environment configuration. The data being gathered is very heirarchical in nature. For example:

customer: bob's tv repair
--environment: unix print
----printers
------printer1
--------attrib1
--------attrib2
--------attrib3
------printer2
--------attrib1
--------attrib2
--------attrib3
----systems
------system1
--------cpu
--------os
--------patch_level
------system2
--------cpu
--------os
--------patch_level
...

I've never used a directory service (like ActiveDirectory or OpenLDAP), but after reading about them, they seem like a more logical option than a RDBMS. Does anyone know if a directory service would make more sense in this case, and if I can store data like the above in such a system?

Is this information created dynamically? Can there be infinite levels?

I've done this a few times using databases, but by hierarchy was defined by the user on the fly. as soon as he added a new level or category, it was present.

Can you tell us when and how this information is created (through an application? is it pre-defined, etc.)

Take a look at a product call Mailtraq

This is a email server but also includs a Ldap server which you can customise.

It has a 30 day trial, or did, so you could have a play and see if it suits your needs. You may be able to get your customers to fill in an email form and send it to the server which will then store the info in the ldap server for you to view via Outlook or anything else that can connect to an Ldap server.

Just a thought.