some warmup questions

hi everyone,

I read quite a few .pdfs but some questions remained unasked and unsolved.
First of all... do I need Novell E-Directory in order to use ZENworks Linux
Management?
According to the .pdfs I need postgresql or oracle. So I guess I don't..
it's not even mentioned
there which leeds me to my next question: does ZENworks linux management
actually
have anything to do with client authentication/authorization? And how do you
allow/disallow
devices to "bind" to the ZENworks server? I issued a "/.../bin/rug sa
http://xx.xx.xx.xx"
ét voilà. joined without any user interaction, no passwords, nothing..
How is the client server communication secured anyway.. except for SSL/TLS
certificates?
To me the whole thing looks very "open to everyone" to me. Working as
intended?
Please enlighten me :)

kind regards
Joseph R.