The BEGIN-VENDOR and END-VENDOR entries consists of a single line of text with two fields, as shown below.


    • The keyword that indicates the format of this entry.

  • vendor-name

    • The name of the vendor.

The following is an example of a BEGIN-VENDOR entry in the dictionary file:


The END-VENDOR entry has the same format as the BEGIN-VENDOR entry. Each BEGIN-VENDOR entry must be followed by a matching END-VENDOR. The END-VENDOR entry can be used only if there is a preceding BEGIN-VENDOR. There cannot be two BEGIN-VENDOR entries in a row. For example, the following dictionary defines the Cisco-AVPair attribute:

ATTRIBUTE       Cisco-AVPair    1    string
END-Vendor      Cisco

The purpose of the BEGIN-VENDOR and END-VENDOR entries is to encapsulate a series of attributes or VSAs for that vendor. Each encapsulated attribute is then defined as being a VSA for that vendor. This method is preferred to the older method used in some dictionaries, wherein the vendor name was added as an option after the attribute type field. This method is simpler and clearer and results in dictionary files that are more understandable.