> When I read the password from the keyboard, the binding does not 
> succeed, though
> it's the same:
> 
> 
> password = $stdin.gets
> password.chomp
> 
> conn = LDAP::Conn.open("ldapserver.mydomain.com")
> conn.simple_bind("cn=username,dc=mydomain,dc=com", password) {
>     # ...
> }
> 

I found it out myself: The trailing newline was the problem.
password.chomp does not remove the newline, but returns another string without 
the newline, which was send to nirvana in my case.

greets Boris