Question

Basically I am creating an employee change request form and want to load up email groups in a selection listed (for add/removing memberships) I am working in Visual C# and trying to create a separate class that uses directory services to accomplish this. When I add the class to the App_Code folder it is no longer able to find the System.DirectoryServices and gives me an error. What am I missing?

Answer 1

If you’re on .NET 3.5 and up, you should check out the System.DirectoryServices.AccountManagement (S.DS.AM) namespace. You’ll need to add this to your project as a .NET reference.

Read all about it here:

Managing Directory Security Principals in the .NET Framework 3.5

Basically, you can define a domain context and easily find users and/or groups in AD:

// set up domain context
PrincipalContext ctx = new PrincipalContext(ContextType.Domain);

// find a user
UserPrincipal user = UserPrincipal.FindByIdentity(ctx, "SomeUserName");

if(user != null)
{
   // do something here....     
}

// find the group in question
GroupPrincipal group = GroupPrincipal.FindByIdentity(ctx, "YourGroupNameHere");

// if found....
if (group != null)
{
   // iterate over members
   foreach (Principal p in group.GetMembers())
   {
      Console.WriteLine("{0}: {1}", p.StructuralObjectClass, p.DisplayName);
      // do whatever you need to do to those members
   }
}

The new S.DS.AM makes it really easy to play around with users and groups in AD: