.NET Developer's Guide to Directory Services Programming, The

This is the eBook version of the printed book. If the print book includes a CD-ROM, this content is not included within the eBook version. “If you have any interest in writing .NET programs using Active Directory or ADAM, this is the book you want to read.” —Joe Richards, Microsoft MVP, directory services Identity and Access Management are rapidly gaining importance as key areas of practice in the IT industry, and directory services provide the fundamental building blocks that enable them. For enterprise developers struggling to build directory-enabled .NET applications, The .NET Developer’s Guide to Directory Services Programming will come as a welcome aid. Microsoft MVPs Joe Kaplan and Ryan Dunn have written a practical introduction to programming directory services, using both versions 1.1 and 2.0 of the .NET Framework. The extensive examples in the book are in C#; a companion Web site includes both C# and Visual Basic source code and examples. Readers will Learn to create, rename, update, and delete objects in Active Directory and ADAM Learn to bind to and search directories effectively and efficiently Learn to read and write attributes of all types in the directory Learn to use directory services within ASP.NET applications Get concrete examples of common programming tasks such as managing Active Directory and ADAM users and groups, and performing authentication Experienced .NET developers—those building enterprise applications or simply interested in learning about directory services—will find that The .NET Developer’s Guide to Directory Services Programming unravels the complexities and helps them to avoid the common pitfalls that developers face.

Table of Contents:
Listings xv Tables xix Foreword xxi Preface xxiii Acknowledgments xxix About the Authors xxxi Part I: Fundamentals 1 Chapter 1: Introduction to LDAP and Active Directory 3 A Brief History of Directory Services 3 Definition of LDAP 4 Definition of Active Directory 5 Definition of ADAM 7 LDAP Basics 11 Chapter 2: Introduction to .NET Directory Services Programming 27 .NET Directory Services Programming Landscape 27 Native Directory Services Programming Landscape 29 System.DirectoryServices Overview 32 System.DirectoryServices.ActiveDirectory Overview 40 System.DirectoryServices.Protocols Overview 43 Selecting the Right Technology 49 Chapter 3: Binding and CRUD Operations with DirectoryEntry 53 Property and Method Overview 54 Binding to the Directory 62 Directory CRUD Operations 98 Chapter 4: Searching with the DirectorySearcher 109 LDAP Searching Overview 109 DirectorySearcher Overview 111 The Basics of Searching 115 Building LDAP Filters 118 Controlling the Content of Search Results 136 Executing the Query and Enumerating Results 139 Returning Many Results with Paged Searches 143 Sorting Search Results 146 Chapter 5: Advanced LDAP Searches 149 Administrative Limits Governing Active Directory and ADAM 150 Understanding Searching Timeouts 152 Optimizing Search Performance 154 Searching the Global Catalog 158 Chasing Referrals 161 Virtual List View Searches 162 Searching for Deleted Objects 169 Directory Synchronization Queries 171 Using Attribute Scope Query 178 Extended DN Queries 181 Reading Security Descriptors with Security Masks 183 Asynchronous Searches 185 Chapter 6: Reading and Writing LDAP Attributes 193 Basics of Reading Attribute Values 193 Collection Class Usage 195 Understanding the ADSI Property Cache 199 LDAP Data Types in .NET 200 ADSI Schema Mapping Mechanism 206 .NET Attribute Value Conversion 213 Standard Data Types 214 Binary Data Conversion 215 COM Interop Data Types 216 Syntactic versus Semantic Conversion 229 Dealing with Attributes with Many Values 230 Basics of Writing Attribute Values 234 Writing COM Interop Types 241 Chapter 7: Active Directory and ADAM Schema 247 Schema Extension Best Practices 247 Choosing an Object Class 251 Choosing Attribute Syntaxes 253 Modeling One-to-Many and Many-to-Many Relationships 256 Search Flags and Indexing 261 Techniques for Extending the Schema 264 Discovering Schema Information at Runtime 266 Chapter 8: Security in Directory Services Programming 273 Binding and Delegation 274 Directory Object Permissions in Active Directory and ADAM 300 Code Access Security 315 Chapter 9: Introduction to the ActiveDirectory Namespace 325 Working with the DirectoryContext Class 326 Locating Domain Controllers 332 Understanding the Active Directory RPC APIs 339 Useful Shortcuts for Developers 339 Part II: Practical Applications 345 Chapter 10: User Management 347 Finding Users 347 Creating Users 351 Managing User Account Features 353 Managing Passwords for Active Directory Users 376 Managing Passwords for ADAM Users 386 Determining User Group Membership in Active Directory and ADAM 389 Chapter 11: Group Management 397 Creating Groups in Active Directory and ADAM 397 Manipulating Group Membership 400 Expanding Group Membership 403 Primary Group Membership 409 Foreign Security Principals 413 Chapter 12: Authentication 417 Authentication Using SDS 418 Authentication Using SDS.P 424 Authentication Using SSPI 428 Discovering the Cause of Authentication Failures 431 Part III: Appendixes 433 Appendix A: Three Approaches to COM Interop with ADSI 435 The Standard Method 435 The Reflection Method 437 Handcrafted COM Interop Declarations 439 Appendix B: LDAP Tools for Programmers 443 LDP 443 ADSI Edit 445 Active Directory Users and Computers 445 LDIFDE 446 ADFind/ADMod 447 BeaverTail LDAP Browser 447 Softerra LDAP Browser 448 Appendix C: Troubleshooting and Help 449 Error 0x8007203A: “The server is not operational.” 449 Error 0x8007052E: “Login Failure: unknown user name or bad password.” 450 Error 0x80072020: “An operations error occurred.” 450 Error 0x80072030: “There is no such object on the server.” 451 Error 0x8007202F: “A constraint violation occurred.” 451 Error 0x80072035: “The server is unwilling to process the request.” 452 Error 0x80070005: “General access denied error.” 452 InvalidOperationException from DirectorySearcher 452 Getting Help 453 Index 455

About the Author :
Joe Kaplan works in Accenture’s internal IT organization, building enterprise applications using the .NET Framework. He specializes in directory services programming, for which he has been recognized as a Microsoft MVP. An industry veteran of more than thirteen years, he also thrives on working with the development community and solving real-world problems. Ryan Dunn of Avanade is a .NET developer and architect with experience in a wide range of industries and technologies. He has consulted on a number of projects to integrate clients’ applications with Active Directory and ADAM. Ryan is a Microsoft MVP for ASP.NET, though he currently focuses primarily on directory services. Ryan can be reached on the Web in the ASP.NET forums or through his blog at http://dunnry.com/blog.