I'm trying to retrieve user information in Active Directory, but am finding some things to be poorly documented. For example, the LDAP connection strings I have seen contain some keywords that I don't know the meaning of. Here's a sample:
LDAP://ofmdcoly302.ofm.wa.lcl/ou=employees,dc=ofm,dc=wa
What are the keywords "ou" and "dc" supposed to signify? In our case "ou=employees" seems to identify a particular AD node. However when I try to do a .FindAll() on the above directory entry, I get "A referral was returned from the server". I guess that means it couldn't find what I was looking for, but it might be available somewhere else? In one place I read "A referral is AD's way of saying, 'this object probably exists in another domain'".
What are "ou" and "dc" supposed to mean? And if I had this A/D structure, how would I code the LDAP connetion string to retrieve information in the "AR" node:
ou and dc are not keywords, they are attributes, "organizational unit" and "domain component", respectively. Attributes are defined in the directory server schema. Attributes are gathered together into entries, of which the distinguished name is the primary key.
Taken in this context, ou and dc are "distinguished name components", together comprising a "distinguished name", which is the aforementioned primary key of an LDAP entry. ou=employees,dc=ofm,dc=wa is a distinguished name composed of the various relative distinguished name components.
This entry has two mistakes: it's not using root (dc=lcl), you also skipped one ou, should be ou=employees,ou=Users - OFMGOV,dc=ofm,dc=wa,dc=lcl
TBH if your really want to understand this notation I would suggest using ADSI Edit instead of ADUC that you probably use ATM - it will show you path the same way, so it will be easier to translate. It will also prevent you from shooting yourself in a foot with special containers like 'CN=Users' and 'CN=Computers':
For the OU you have highlighted it would most likely be:
ou=AR,ou=Citrix,ou=Users - OFMGOV,dc=ofm,dc=wa,dc=lcl
Related
For authentication in Jitsi Meet, we would like to read out a Windows AD group with an ldap query. Unfortunately our ldap query does not work.
LDAP_URL=ldaps://server.domain.local:636/
LDAP_BASE=DC=domain,DC=local
LDAP_BINDDN=CN=bind_user,OU=Administrative Accounts,OU=Benutzer,DC=domain,DC=local
LDAP_BINDPW=*
LDAP_FILTER= (&(|objectclass=user))(|(memberof=CN=group,OU=Jitsi,OU=Sicherheit,OU=Gruppen,DC=domain,DC=local)
(primaryGroupID=4989))
The error must be due to the filter, it works with the filter LDAP_FILTER = (sAMAccountName =% u).
Can you tell me what is wrong with our query.
A few things stand out to me:
The | in front of objectClass should not be there.
You have two closing parentheses after the objectClass condition, but the second one should be moved to the end of the whole query.
Oddly, objectClass=user will actually end up including other objects than just user accounts (like computer accounts). If you want to filter to only user objects, you have to use both (objectClass=user)(objectCategory=person). But that would only matter if you have other types of objects as members of that group.
Maybe this is just an error with pasting into the question, but there is a line break before (primaryGroupID=
I've never used Jitsi, but it may or may not like the space after LDAP_FILTER=. The other examples I see online don't show a space there.
It should look like this:
LDAP_FILTER=(&(objectclass=user)(objectCategory=person)(|(memberof=CN=group,OU=Jitsi,OU=Sicherheit,OU=Gruppen,DC=domain,DC=local)(primaryGroupID=4989)))
That means: find all user objects that are either members of that group, or have a primary group ID of 4989.
Currently I'm using OpenDS and have to migrate to Active Directory (AD LDS).
I have a few custom attributes/objects that are defined in .ldif files in the OpenDS/config/schema directory like this:
attributeTypes: ( 1.3.6.1.4.1.99.1
NAME 'myNewAttribute'
DESC 'some text'
EQUALITY caseIgnoreMatch
SYNTAX 1.3.6.1.4.1.1466.115.121.1.15
SINGLE-VALUE
)
objectClasses: ( 1.3.6.1.4.1.99.2
NAME 'myNewClass'
SUP top STRUCTURAL
MUST ( person $ myNewAttribute )
MAY someOtherAttribute
)
Unfortunately ldifde does not understand this format, so I used ADSI Edit to import my definitions manually one by one (cumbersome!) - but encountered some problems:
It seems AD supports only a handful of different SYNTAX definitions, like 2.5.5.12. How can I map something like 1.3.6.1.4.1.1466.115.121.1.15 to AD?
oMSyntax: Seems to be AD specific and not known to the rest of the LDAP world. oMSyntax in combination with attributeSyntax seems to define the data type in the AD world.
things like EQUALITY seem to be missing completely in AD! How to deal with this?
Question: Is there a tool to convert an LDIF file with attribute/object definitions to a format that is understood by MS / AD / ldifde?
Or a more general question: What is the best practice to migrate attribute/object definitions from OpenDS, OpenLDAP, etc. to the Microsoft world?
Welcome to the Diretories compatibility world. First of all the following syntax :
attributeTypes: ( 1.3.6.1.4.1.99.1
NAME 'myNewAttribute'
DESC 'some text'
EQUALITY caseIgnoreMatch
SYNTAX 1.3.6.1.4.1.1466.115.121.1.15
SINGLE-VALUE
)
is not an LDIF syntax. it's a syntax used in Netscape like Directories to specify the Schema (OpenLDAP, Ex Sun directory service etc.). As far as you want to introduce new attributes and classes in Active Directory, you can do it using one of these 3 ways :
Manualy using the common ADSIEDIT.MSC (I never do it like that) :
Manualy using the specific Active Directory Scema Editor MMC (Microsoft Management Console)
This is the way I use in the development phase.
MMC.EXE -> File -> Open Component -> Active Directory Schema
If you are using an old server this MMC is only available recording an Active X component :
Regsvr32 c:\windows\system32\schmmgmt.msc
This way is much easier, it's the way I use on a development VM to create my attributes, I Then export the LDIF description with LDIFDE.EXE tool in order to clean it (remove system attributes) and import it on the production servers.
Programaticaly using LDIF
Here is an example of the LDIF syntax of an attribute
dn: CN=SlxChapitres,CN=Schema,CN=Configuration,DC=XXXX
changetype: add
objectClass: top
objectClass: attributeSchema
cn: SlxChapitres
distinguishedName: CN=SlxChapitres,CN=Schema,CN=Configuration,DC=XXXX
instanceType: 4
attributeID: 1.3.6.1.4.1.10558.2.1.6
attributeSyntax: 2.5.5.4
isSingleValued: FALSE
showInAdvancedViewOnly: TRUE
adminDisplayName: SlxChapitres
oMSyntax: 20
lDAPDisplayName: SlxChapitres
name: SlxChapitres
objectCategory: CN=Attribute-Schema,CN=Schema,CN=Configuration,DC=XXXX
This code is LDIF, I can inject it using LDIDE.EXE program the DC=XXXX syntax allowing me to use the -c DNSrc DNTarget of the LDIFFDE.EXE program option to locate it to the right DN.
As far as the Syntax and the matching rules are concerned, In my opinion Active-Directory is not so standard. Microsoft use a kind of combination between these to concepts to give one thing they call Syntax. Whenever you create a new attribute, you must specify its syntax. To uniquely identify the syntax among the total set of 21 syntaxes, you must specify 2 pieces of information: the OID of the syntax and a so-called OM syntax. This pair of values must be set together and correctly correlate with Mictosoft documention.
I am working with a customers Active Directory which has a lot of cruft in it. There are hundreds of Users with empty givenName and sn attributes. I would like to filter any records that have an empty sn or an empty givenName from my query results as those records cannot be processed by my application.
This works as per my requirements but I believe there must be a better way to do it:
(&(objectClass=User)(|(!(!(sn=*))))(!(!(givenName=*)))))
Is there a more clear and concise way to accomplish this with an ldap query?
sn and givenName have as their superior the name attribute, which is of DirectoryString syntax, that is, the syntax is 1.3.6.1.4.1.1466.115.121.1.15. Attributes which are of syntax DirectoryString are not allowed to be null, that is, a DirectoryString is required to have at least one character.
The filter sn=* is a present filter (not a substring or regular expression), meaning that the entry would be filtered out of the possible search results if the sn attribute is not present (if it is present, it must have at least one character). Same for givenName=*.
A simpler filter might be '(&)', where the search request contains the following in its list of attributes to be returned: #User, which will return all attributes in the User objectClass for each entry that matches the filter, then have the application extract the sn and givenName attributes from each entry that is returned. If the number of entries returned is large, use the Simple Paged Results Request Control to throttle the number of entries returned to a more manageable value.
Or ... it might be that Active Directory is not LDAP compliant and does not support the inetOrgPerson objectClass and syntaxes of attributes therein correctly and does allow empty or null attributes values for DirectoryString attributes, though I can't imagine Microsoft would deliver a product that is not LDAP compliant.
see also
LDAP Programming Practices
RFC 4519
(!(!(givenName=*))) = (!givenName=*)
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee198810.aspx
I have a web app, I'd like the user to supply their real name, for friend searches. I'm not sure whether to store this as two separate fields in my user class, or as a single field:
class User {
#Persistent
private String mFirstName;
#Persistent
private String mLastName;
}
.. or ..
class User {
#Persistent
private String mFullName;
}
I'm only going to use it to let users search for people. For example, they might search for "John", or "John Doe", or "Doe". I'm not sure what the app engine query engine allows us to do here, in terms of partial matches and such - has anyone gone through this and can recommend a good solution? I'm leaning towards just storing the full name to make searches easier,
Thanks
It's not just a question of how you end up storing names, it also matters how you ask for names on your web form.
If you prompt with a first and last field, the vast majority of inputs will probably conform, but you'll still have many exceptions (prefixes, middle names, suffixes, punctuation, etc).
If you clearly prompt with separate prefix, first name, middle name, last name, suffix fields, there'll be even fewer exceptions, but users might get peeved or confused.
You might even offer both: an easy one-field input or preparsed multifield input. Explore what other web sites do and see if you find them appealing/confusing/whatever.
Also keep in mind that if you input separate fields you can always easily join them later, but if you input only a single field you won't have the typist's help if you need to parse it later.
Short answer: store a full name.
Long answer here (Falsehoods programmers believe about names, by Patrick McKenzie).
I’m going to list assumptions your systems probably make about names. All of these assumptions are wrong.
(#1) People have exactly one canonical full name.
(#20) People have last names, family names, or anything else which is shared by folks recognized as their relatives.
I'm a little confused by these two terms: "Legacy Distinguished Name"(Legacy DN) and "Distingushed Name"(DN).
The first term Legacy DN seems only for Exchange, while the latter DN is only mentioned for Active Directory.
They are obviously not in same format:
DN is like: CN=Morgan Cheng, OU= SomeOrg, DC=SomeCom, DC=com
LegacyDN is like: /o=SomeDomain/ou=SomeGroup/cn=Recipients/cn=Morgan Cheng
I am still not clear what exactly the differce is. Are they two totally differnt stuff? or just same info represented in two different forms?
And, why is it called "Legacy"? If it is legacy, something must be new, right?
Hope some AD and Exchang experts can give me some inputs.
In Exchange 5.5, Exchange was assigning distinguished names to accounts and mailboxes (Obj-Dist-Name). When Active Directory came along, Exchange 2000 and later would use its distinguished names instead. In order to preserve backwards compatibility, migration from Exchange 5.5 to Exchange 2000 carried over the old DNs into the legacyExchangeDN attribute of ActiveDirectory.
Some applications continue to refer to Obj-Dist-Name. To preserve compatibility with these applications, later exchange versions synthesize a legacyExchangeDN value even for objects that have not been migrated from Exchange 5.5. The RUS automatically sets it to some value, apparently to the same value as the distinguishedName in your case.
The "new" way (since 2000) is to refer to objects by distinguished name, not Obj-Dist-Name.