Shariq Sheikh | Port 389

For small shops that do not leverage automated provisioning tools, they face challenge in keeping the attributes for Users and other objects in AD standardized. For similar situation, recently I was asked from Access Control team if there is an easy way to fix the displayName attribute for all users or to fill in the display name where its missing based on the Users’ first and last name. The answer is a simple PowerShell one-liner using Quest Cmdlets.

Using Get-QADUser cmdlet, you can define the location of all your users using the –searchlevel parameter or you can sweep the whole directory for all user accounts. And then pipe the results to the foreach and use Set-QADuser to fix the display names (in this example) based on the users’ first and last name

Get-QADUser mydomain.int/users -sl 0 | foreach {Set-QADUser $_ -DisplayName ("{0} {1}" -f $_.firstname,$_.lastname)}

The –sl 0 parameter defines the limit of users to 0.

What is Active Directory Tombstone Lifetime (TSL) ?

The tombstone lifetime in an Active Directory forest determines how long a deleted object (called a “tombstone”) is retained in Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS). The tombstone lifetime is determined by the value of the tombstoneLifetime attribute on the Directory Service object in the configuration directory partition.

Directory Services veteran and MVP Joe Richards has published a short blog entry demystifying the confusion a technet article has caused in regards to how to go about figuring a TSL on a particular domain. Note that new forests that are installed with Windows Server 2003 with SP1 and up have a default tombstone lifetime of 180 days.

Joe shares his ADFIND tool to lookup the current value of the TSL attribute (irrespective of what OS was used to build the forest). Note that as Joe pointed out if this attribute is not set (i.e empty value) then the TSL is 60 days. Here I show you how to lookup the TSL with PowerShell.

Using Quest cmdlets :

Get-QADbject “CN=Directory Service,CN=Windows NT,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=yourdomain,DC=int” includeallproperties | Select TombstoneLifetime

And with using native AD cmdlets (of ADWS) in Windows Server 2008 R2 :

Get-ADObject -Identity “CN=Directory Service,CN=Windows NT,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=R2,DC=lab” -properties tombstonelifetime

Also within PowerShell, you can also use ADSI to lookup the TSL value.

[ADSI]$config=LDAP://cn=Directory Service,cn=Windows NT,cn=Services,cn=Configuration,DC=R2,dc=lab

$config.TombstoneLifetime

Also, here is how you can use DSQUERY from the Windows Support Tools to lookup the TSL.

dsquery * “CN=Directory Service,CN=Windows NT,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=R2,DC=lab” -scope base –attr

tombstonelifetime

Note that I have used my test forest’s DN of R2.lab in above examples, be sure to replace the values with your forest’s DN. Above query should be typed in one line.

As usual a good conversation spurred on ActiveDir on a much discussed scenario of virtualizing your DCs while be varied of the known pitfalls. While virtualized DCs are fully supported on either competing virtualization solution by Microsoft, one known subject I would like to highlight here is the proper time synchronization. You must make sure that your PDCe gets its time from an external time source and other DCs follow the PDCe. All DCs (including PDCe) must not sync their time with the virtualization host, whether its VMware ESX or that of Hyper-V. It was discussed how by default the VMware’s VM settting does not have the time synchronization enabled by default, and my brief look at the Hyper-V’s VM suggested that it is. In any case, you must make sure that setting is disabled, thus VM does sync its time with its host.

VMware time setting from the VMware tools within the VM:

Or under the VM settings from VIC :

Hyper-V setting from the VM settings :

A great resource to refer to, to learn how to configure an authoritative time source for your DCs – see this KB http://support.microsoft.com/kb/816042

One of the DNS improvements in Windows Server 2008 R2 is DNS Cache Locking in which if configured the cache entries are not allowed to be modified for the percentage of TTL.

Cache locking is a new security feature available with Windows Server® 2008 R2 that allows you to control whether or not information in the DNS cache can be overwritten. When a recursive DNS server responds to a query, it will cache the results obtained so that it can respond quickly if it receives another query requesting the same information. The period of time the DNS server will keep information in its cache is determined by the Time to Live (TTL) value for a resource record. Until the TTL period expires, information in the cache might be overwritten if updated information about that resource record is received. If an attacker successfully overwrites information in the cache, they might be able to redirect traffic on your network to a malicious site.

Cache locking is configured as a percent value. For example, if the cache locking value is set to 50, then the DNS server will not overwrite a cached entry for half of the duration of the TTL. By default, the cache locking percent value is 100. This means that cached entries will not be overwritten for the entire duration of the TTL. The cache locking value is stored in the CacheLockingPercent registry key. If the registry key is not present, then the DNS server will use the default cache locking value of 100.

You can configure the CacheLocking with DNSCMD utility from the command line (launched under elevated rights).

dnscmd /Config /CacheLockingPercent <percent>

You may also check the current percentage set for this setting with the /info switch of DNSCMD.

With above, the pertinent DWORD registry key is created under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\DNS\Parameters

However, in real world you push down this registry key via Group Policy Preferences to all your DNS servers. Values for the key are shown below.

A request came in from the Access Control team requesting that they be provided with the users that have been created in a particular office since last 90 days. As usual, PowerShell (with QAD cmdlets) has very simple one liners you can retrieve this information with.

You may also use this to export this data to a CSV file. Notice that when using the export-csv cmdlet you must choose the ‘select’ and define the attributes that should be exported. Format-Table (aliased above as FT) is used to display the information on the console.

GetQADUser-sizelimit 0 | where{$_.whencreated -gt (get-date).adddays(-90)}| select Name,WhenCreated,DN | Export-csv c:\Users90days.csv

There is always a couple of ways to accomplish the same task with further fine tuning your query. As you can see that above query would grab all the users in the domain, going by their whenCreated attribute and present you the pertinent users.

You can define the OU to search with the –searchroot parameter.

Get-QADUser –Searchroot ‘test.mydomain.int/Users/Chicago/’ | where{$_.whencreated -gt (get-date).adddays(-90)}

Alternatively, if you would to like find users account that have been modified since x number of days, you can try something like this.

$OU = <OU PATH>
Get-QADUser -LastChangedAfter (get-date).adddays(-7) -search $OU -sl 0 | ft name,whenchanged

Previously I had posted the 2003 AD and 2008 Features jigsaw posters, Mike Kline informed me that there is now a 2008 R2 Features poster.

You can download the 44×24in poster from here

As usual Joe shared a great insight that trusts well-doing can in one way be verified by checking the trust accounts for their last password resets. When trusts are created the accounts for them are by default created under ‘Users’ container, and are named as TrustedDomain$ and just like computer accounts, trusts reset their password every 30 days, and . He showed how to look up the ‘pwdlastset’ attribute using his ADFIND tool. Below I show you the PowerShell way.

$old=(get-date).adddays(-30)

Get-QADUser -SearchRoot ‘mydomain.int/users’ -Name “*$*” -IncludedProperties pwdlastset | where {$_.pwdlastset –gt $old}

You may also sort and view the results as below

Any trusts that have not reset their passwords in last 30 days are probably no longer valid. If you are using ADWS on Windows Server 2008 R2, then something like below should suffice, assuming you have already created the $old variable using the same command as above.

Get-ADUser -Filter ‘Name -like “*$*”‘ -Properties pwdlastset | where {$_.pwdlastset –gt $old}

Here is quick snippet of password set/reset ‘Set-ADaccountPassword’ cmdlet in 08 R2 via ADWS (native AD cmdlets) and a test screencast from me.

I highly recommend to use the built in cmdlet help to learn the syntax and available parameters. Whether you are using the cmdlet as an one-off task or trying to incorporate it into a script.

First we run, Help Set-ADaccountPassword -examples to look at what the options are and then use,

Set-ADaccountPassword -Identity Moyo -reset where the user id is moyo, and provide the new value of the password. Unlike many other functions where you must run the ADWS under elevated ‘administrative’ privileges, if you are running this cmdlet on your DC, you can run this under normal security context.

Previously I had briefly written about ADAC and today we take a look at some of the things you can accomplish by this new interface of Active Directory.

We start out by launching the ADAC, by running DSAC.exe from the run window

ADAC offers two views, the list view

and the tree view

There are several useful queries built-in which you can add from the ‘Add criteria’ button such as find all the users with expired passwords

And add multiple criteria to your query

From the task pane, you can create a new user

Its an ease of use to be able to fill in all the pertinent attributes from a single interface

Now you can raise DFL and FFL from one location, previously you had to raise the FFL from AD Domains and Trusts snap-in

From the Global Search page, you can simply also add your own LDAP query

You can add specific navigation nodes into your list-view such as the Users container and apply different filters (query) to do a comparison side-by-side, from the same ‘add navigation nodes’ window you can also add other trusted domains to manage multi-domain environment all in one place.

For more info. see http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd560651(WS.10).aspx

Also watch this short webcast by Kevin Remde http://edge.technet.com/Media/Exploring-the-Active-Directory-Administrative-Center-SRV311-Part-1-of-5/

I had earlier posted about the Add-Computer cmdlet bug in Windows 7 RC builds which didn’t allow the computer to be added to the domain via PowerShell. With Windows 7 RTM, it is fixed and turns out to be pretty handy should you need to script the domain joins for your new builds. The command to add the machine is pretty simple.

The –passthru switch as chosen in the example shows the results.

Check out help for what you can do with this cmdlet such as when you need to add the computer account to a specific OU. Remember that adding machine via PowerShell to the domain does not require you to create the computer name before hand, but it pre-exists than its not an issue.

Few examples :

Add-Computer -domainname Domain02 -OUPath OU=testOU,DC=domain,DC=Domain,DC=com

Add-computer -workgroupname WORKGROUP-A

Add-computer -domainname Domain01; restart-computer   (this adds the restart option)

For more info. see http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd347556.aspx

For reasons unknown to me the useful Rename-Computer cmdlet (shown in my earlier example) seems to have been removed past CTP3 builds and the RTM. Even though the technet reference for all Windows 7 PowerShell cmdlets still has it listed.

Here is a discussion I found.

http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/w7itproinstall/thread/8cdf0302-a41d-4973-9bff-2923e7ad0178

ADMGS aka AD Web Services aka Powershell Native AD cmdlets which is originally a Windows Server 2008 R2 feature is out of beta and can be downloaded from here for DCs running down level OSs.

The Active Directory Management Gateway Service enables administrators to use the Active Directory module for Windows PowerShell and the Active Directory Administrative Center running on Windows Server 2008 R2 or Windows 7 to access or manage directory service instances that are running on Windows Server 2008 or Windows Server 2003 DCs.

“Note:    Installing the Active Directory Management Gateway Service on your Windows Server 2008–based or Windows Server 2003–based servers does not make it possible for you to install the Active Directory module or the Active Directory Administrative Center (which is available only on Windows Server 2008 R2 or Windows 7 operating systems) on these servers. “

For more info see http://www.shariqsheikh.com/blog/index.php/200907/what-is-active-directory-management-gateway-service-admgs/

The Active Directory Groups Nesting restrictions is an often-discussed topic among my peers especially in a multi-domain forest and often a question raised in forums and mailing lists. Although there have been some great blogs written that dive deep into the technical restrictions, I personally needed a simple reference chart that I could refer to and which serves me as a memory refresher. Between the two types of Active Directory Groups, Security and Distributions, there are restrictions in both but this attempted reference chart covers only Security type. There are three scopes of Security Groups. Domain Local, Global, and Universal. A leading practice for each of these scopes for NTFS permissions is as follows. Domain Local Groups are used for permissions (ACLs), Users are populated in Global Groups, and Universal Groups are used to manage Global Groups. But often times there are needs to circumvent this model and cross nesting is required especially in a multi-domain forest or in a large environment with multiple forests. The nesting restrictions of each group that you must know about can be broken into three questions and subsequent charts below :

Please note that these nesting restrictions assume Window 2000 native or Windows Server 2003 DFL.

1. Which particular group will take other scope type (nested) as its member i.e from the same domain and from a trusted domain ?

Chart 1 for Question # 1

Chart 2 for Question # 1

2. Where can a particular group be assigned permissions (ACL) i.e only in the domain where it resides and also cross domains ? (trusted or other child domains within the same forest )

All three scope types can be used to assign permissions in the same domain where the groups reside.

Chart 1 for Question # 2

3. Which group will accept users and computers from same and trusted domain ?

All three scope types will accept Users and Workstation from the same domain where they reside.

Chart 1 for Question # 3

More information on the scope of these groups can be found here:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc755692.aspx

To learn about a leading access control model known as AGDLP see :

http://searchwindowsserver.techtarget.com/tip/0,289483,sid68_gci1255549,00.html

A question was raised on ActiveDir, and I learned about an old TechNet Jigsaw on AD’s interworking.

Along with that, there was a new Windows Server 2008 AD Feature Components which I received at Tech-Ed 2007 and it illustrates the new and improved AD pieces introduced with Windows Server 2008. This poster covers ADLDS, ADFS, ADRMS, and RODCs.

And an additional poster on general new Windows Server 2008 Feature Components that covers TS, NAP, IIS 7.0, Virtualization, Server Core and BitLocker.

Both of the above illustrations and very good quality large size posters (30×20in) and are good to hang in your office/cube. Printing them on regular printer may distort the quality, so you may try the plotter . All three can be downloaded from the following links :

TechNet Magazine Active Directory Component Jigsaw Poster

Windows Server 2008 Component Posters (both)

P.S This is my first test post using WLW.

What is the AdminSDHolder and SDPROP ?

Ever wonder what controls the native permissions on the security principal such as Domain Admins and Administrators in Active Directory ? What if an owner changes the permission these entities have ? The permissions do come back. They must. John Policelli had a great article on the subject of AdminSDHolder and SDPROP in this month’s technet article. The magic is driven by the AdminSDHolder which is an object that resides under the System container of Domain NC. This object has a unique ACL which is used to control the permissions of security principals that are members of built-in AD groups, also known as “protected groups”. The SDPROP (Security Descriptor Propagator) is the process that runs in the background and complies all the permissions according to the AdminSDHolder.

Every hour, a background process called SDPROP runs on the domain controller that holds the PDC Emulator operations master role. It compares the ACL on all security principals (users, groups and computer accounts) that belong to protected groups against the ACL on the AdminSDHolder object. If the ACL lists aren’t the same, the ACL on the security principal is overwritten with the ACL from the Admin–SDHolder object. In addition, inheritance is disabled on the security principal.

John has done an excellent job on explaining the process and how it can affect you. I would like to show you the one-liners with which you can look-up who is part of that “elite” bunch in your AD with PowerShell (ADWS) on Windows Server 2008 R2 and as well with PowerShell (and Quest) in Windows Server 2003 domain.

For every recipient of this process i.e security principal such as user, group or computer, there is an attribute named “admincount” that gets marked as “1″ indicating that this principal via nesting or explicitly is part of a protected group in AD.

On Windows Server 2008 R2 where can you use (ADWS), the simple command to retrieve the user and group objects with admincount set as 1 is this.

Get-ADgroup -LDAPFilter “(admincount=1)” | select name

Get-ADuser -LDAPFilter “(admincount=1)” | select name

In domains that are pre-Windows Server 2008 R2, you can use similar QAD cmdlets.

Get-QADGroup -LDAPFilter “(admincount=1)”

Get-QADuser -LDAPFilter “(admincount=1)”

If you would just like to get the total number of users, you may count it like this.

(Get-QADuser -Ldap “(admincount=1)”).count

Another great read on AdminCount, AdminSDHolder, and SDPROP is right here from Mike B. Smith.

Some discrepencies pointed out by Joe in the technet article. He explains in great detail. http://blog.joeware.net/2009/09/08/1693/

I have created an Active Directory Custom Search Engine (using Google CSE). It searches for the relevant content based on the sites I have added. The point is to remove all the unnecessary hits you get from using the regular Google search and make sure you get hits from the most smart AD bloggers. I have also added a few PoSH blogs from folks who often write on the “AD management” with PowerShell. So far the engine only searches in the 35 sites I have added, I will be certainly adding more so feel free to leave a comment with your suggestion. Click here to get to it.

So next time you have an AD related query, just type it up in this search engine and you are likely to find what you are looking for. The searched site list is of the prestigious AD bloggers and writers (MVPs,ActiveDir and EE) whom its very likely to find a discussed topic from to your AD query. Personally, it serves me as a tool I could go back to when I remember that I had read about something particular on someone’s blog but can’t remember whose site it was.

Here is the list of searched sites and it will likely be growing.

http://blogs.dirteam.com/blogs/tomek/

http://blogs.dirteam.com/blogs/carlos/

http://blogs.technet.com/activedirectoryua/

http://blogs.dirteam.com/blogs/acefekay/

http://blogs.dirteam.com/blogs/paulbergson/

http://msmvps.com/blogs/UlfBSimonWeidner/

http://blogs.dirteam.com/blogs/sanderberkouwer/

http://blog.joeware.net

http://www.briandesmond.com/blog

http://www.bsonposh.com

http://blogs.msdn.com/adpowershell/

http://blogs.technet.com/heyscriptingguy/

http://jdhitsolutions.com/blog/

http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/blogs/ScriptFanatic/

http://blogs.msdn.com/powershell/

http://poshoholic.com/

http://jacksonshaw.blogspot.com/

http://tigermatt.wordpress.com/

http://www.highorbit.co.uk/

http://www.frickelsoft.net/blog/

http://dmitrysotnikov.wordpress.com/

http://adisfun.blogspot.com/

http://www.open-a-socket.com/

http://www.shutuplaura.com/

http://www.joekaplan.net/

http://www.sdmsoftware.com/blog/

http://imav8n.wordpress.com/

http://blogs.technet.com/josebda/

http://blogs.technet.com/askds/

http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/blogs/guyt/

http://www.gilkirkpatrick.com/Blog/

http://blogs.technet.com/grouppolicy/

http://blogs.dirteam.com/blogs/jorge/

http://blogs.technet.com/instan/default.aspx

http://blogs.technet.com/ad/default.aspx

Thanks to Mike Kline for sharing a couple of links.

Update :
Following links were shared by weemat

blogs.technet.com/filecab
blogs.technet.com/networking
blogs.technet.com/askperf
blogs.msdn.com/w32time

As named domain modes in Windows 2000 time, Domain Functional Level and Forest Functional Level (introduced in Windows Server 2003) list has grown with the inception of two new Windows Server 2008 functional levels. While Domain Functional Level limits the OS of the DCs, a raise to the Forest Functional Level (in a multi-domain environment) can only be achieved after all child domains’ DFL have been met. Both Functional Levels do not dictate the type of OS you can run on your member servers. They dictate which OS can run on a DC and introduce new functionality to AD as you move up the ladder. Such as, to be able to take advantage of AD Recycle Bin functionality all your DCs must be running Windows Server 2008 R2 and the FFL must be at 2008 R2.

There are now 6 different types of Domain Functional Levels;

1. Windows 2000 Mixed (supports NT4/2000/2003 DCs)
2. Windows 2000 Native (supports 2000/2003 DCs)
3. Windows Server 2003 Interim (supports NT4/2003 DCs)
4. Windows Server 2003 (supports only 2003 DCs)
5. Windows Server 2008 (supports only 2008 DCs)
6. Windows Server 2008 R2 (supports only 2008 R2 DCs)

And five forest functional levels:

1. Windows 2000 (supports NT4/2000/2003 DCs)
2. Windows 2003 Interim (supports NT4/2003 DCs)
3. Windows Server 2003 (supports only 2003 DCs)
4. Windows Server 2008 (supports only 2008 DCs)
5. Windows Server 2008 R2 (supports only 2008 R2 DCs)

See this for list of features for different Functional Levels.

Says the RID Master FSMO to a RODC. If you recall the RID Master’s sole job is to make sure that duplicate SIDs are not issued by domain controllers. Whenever a DC needs to create a SID, it takes the next available value from its own RID pool to create the SID with a unique value. The default pool size is 500 RIDs. When we run the RID pool test on a RODC, the test skips due to the DC being RODC and not having anything to do with the creation of the new objects.

dcdiag /v /test:ridmanager

Here is how the test is supposed to report back with the remaining pool of the allocated RIDs.

Windows Server 2008 R2 provides a web service that is required by ADAC and native AD-Cmdlets of PowerShell, that service in known as ADWS and its part of proverbial ADMGS framework. So ADMGS equals ADWS out-of-box. The service lets Server 2008 R2 AD PowerShell cmdlets and other applications work against the DCs with ADMGS installed. And its final version has been released with Windows Server 2008 R2 which hit RTM earlier this week. That ADMGS framework and comparison of changes from 2008 to 2008 R2 was briefly discussed in a Brian Desmond’s webcast a few months back.

Something not part of the original plan and considered due to high demand is that now you have ADWS add-on service/functionality available to manage your down-level DCs such as Windows Server 2003 and 2008 (non-R2). This means you don’t have to be at 2008 R2 FFL to run this.

Below is excerpted from ADPoSH Blog :

1. Visit http://connect.microsoft.com and enter the invitation ID ADWS-FDBT-CVJK on the home page.
2. Sign in using your live/hotmail ID
3. Active Directory Management Gateway Service download details and instructions will be available to you on MS Connect site – http://connect.microsoft.com/ADWS/

Once you have it installed, you can take advantage of native AD PowerShell Cmdlets. This certainly adds good competitiveness to the cmdlets world and Quest Active Roles QAD cmdlets finally have something to compete against.

Fore more information see : http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;969041&sd=rss&spid=12925

Microsoft earlier this month released the AD Risk Assessment Program Scoping Tool to public. My look at it tells me that this tool essentially more fancily does what ADRAP Sutiability Scripts did, which came with ADRAP Snapshot Tool, which of course came when you had the official ADRAP engagement and cut a check for it. As beneficial as ADRAP could be for a mid-to-large AD environment, I felt in my experience that it never had enough word of mouth. Very few people seem to have heard of it and there isn’t a lot information publicly available for the program, so until you have it done you have a very little idea on what the program offers. This tool is to do just that, it makes the program more public, it gives you a quick glimpse of what the program is about as well as it readies your environment for the actual ADRAP sweep, hence named Scoping Tool. Below you will see the simple 8 steps process that runs several checks on your AD environment and creates a nice HTML report at the end which you would supposedly send it to your TAM prior to the engagement. Regardless of whether you will have the engagement or not, I think this tool serves as a quick snapshot into your environment. This tool is however intended for premier customers.

Download the tool here

Get white papers regarding Active Directory Risk Assessment Program

Much has been said about the manageability of AD Recycle Bin in Windows Server 2008 R2 via the Microsoft’s intended way i.e via PoSH cmdlets. Though this option stays to be only enable-able via PowerShell, the ability to restore objects (the process of reanimation of objects in earlier ADs) has been extended to GUI by Overall Solutions Inc. The GUI tool is very simple to use and its available for free. Below I show you how to restore a deleted OU with objects inside via this tool. See previous post on how to enable the AD Recycle Bin feature in your Windows Server 2008 R2 forest.

We delete an OU called Chicago which contains a Global Group.

Launch the ADRecycleBin tool (be sure to launch it under administrator’s context)

Right click on the child object of a deleted tree and select all

Click on Restore Deleted Object on top right corner

And its simple as that. Lesson of the story, there is always a window for someone to step in and fill the void. I had earlier posted how Server Core that was intended to be managed via CLI only had made a  U-TURN in R2 release of Windows Server 2008. Personally, I wouldn’t mind having to manage this feature solely from PowerShell, but its nice to have the GUI option available.

Download the tool here.

Launch the PowerShell under Administrator’s account context, and type this cmdlet.

Enable-ADOptionalFeature -Identity ‘CN=Recylcle Bin Feature,CN=Optional Features,CN=Directory Service,CN=Windows NT,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=yourdomain,DC=com

Read and understand the warning of this action’s irreversebility, and hit “Y” for yes to continue.

In following screenshot I show you an error not neccesarily applicable to you, the cmdlet complained about not being able to verify the FSMO ownership role. The reason for this was the fact that in my VM Lab environment I had shut down another DC for maintenance and it had not been replicated or talked to.

As I brought that downed DC back online, forced the replication, I was able to proceed. You can then confirm with this cmdlet.

Get-ADOptionalFeature ‘Recycle Bin Feature’

Here is a great post on this hot feaure of Windows Server 2008 R2.

http://msmvps.com/blogs/ad/archive/2009/03/31/taking-out-the-trash.aspx

As briefly discussed before, a feature to offline domain join machines is available in Windows Server 2008 R2. The utility is called “djoin.exe” which is used to perform this task. Here is an official blurb on what the offline domain join is what it would be used for and then I will show you how to perform this simple task.

“Offline domain join is a new process that computers that run Windows® 7 or Windows Server® 2008 R2 can use to join a domain without contacting a domain controller. This makes it possible to join computers to a domain in locations where there is no connectivity to a corporate network. For example, an organization might need to deploy many virtual machines in a datacenter. Offline domain join makes it possible for the virtual machines to be joined to the domain when they initially start after the installation of the operating system. No additional restart is required to complete the domain join. This can significantly reduce the overall time required for wide-scale virtual machine deployments.

A domain join establishes a trust relationship between a computer running a Windows operating system and an Active Directory® domain. This operation requires state changes to Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) and state changes on the computer that is joining the domain. To complete a domain join in the past using previous Windows® operating systems, the computer that joined the domain had to be running and it had to have network connectivity to contact a domain controller”

I created the metadata as known as “blob” on one of my DC for a Server named 2008R2RC2 that I wanted to join to domain offline (i.e the target machine not connected to the network) and saved it to a txt file called computer_prov, then as usual I run the help on the utility to learn what syntax it has available. Here is the command syntax I ran to provision the computer account and to create the metadata.

djoin /provision /domain techevan.lab /machine 2008R2RC2 /savefile c:computer_prov.txt

I then jumped on the target machine, copy the txt file over and try to run needed syntax with the djoin utility

djoin /requestODJ /loadfile c:computer_prov.txt /windowspath %SystemRoot% /localos

I get an error that I am not running the Shell with elevated privileges, I get out and get back in with the “run as administrator” option, and get the same error.

Perhaps its a bug in RC release, I then tried the same syntax from the conventional CMD line window and was successful.

I then restarted the target computer and machine had been joined to the domain.

For more information please see, http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd392267(WS.10).aspx

A couple years back someone made a recommendation on Microsoft Exchange Forums that equivalent to Exchange BPA, it would be nice for AD Admins to have an AD Best Practices Analyzer, this was passed on to the AD Team. Though I am not if this particular thread was the driver behind it, but starting in Windows Server 2008 R2, AD Admin will have the BPA.

“Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) Best Practices Analyzer (BPA) is a server management tool that can help you implement best practices in the configuration of your Active Directory environment. AD DS BPA scans the AD DS server role as it is installed on your Windows Server 2008 R2 domain controllers, and it reports best practice violations. You can filter or exclude results from AD DS BPA reports that you do not need to see. You can also perform AD DS BPA tasks by using either the Server Manager graphical user interface (GUI) or cmdlets in the Windows PowerShell command-line interface.”

ADBPA is a great idea, it gives you a quick glance into the new DC you have just stood up. It points you toward setting the NTP settings correctly if the DC is also PDC. It lets you know if your OUs are not set to be protected from accidental deletion. It also reminds you that certain directory partitions (NC) have not been backed up since a certain of period time. You can access the ADBPA from the Server Manager -> ADDS.

You may notice that if you are running the Windows Server 2008 Beta version, there seems to be a bug with ADBPA rule. One of the non-compliant complain is about the DC’s inability to reach a DNS server to retrieve DC specific records even when the DC itself is also the DNS and the pertaining records are existing. This behavior has been corrected in the RC version.

The compliant section also shows where your DC meets the expected configuration, such as when it advertises itself as a DC in its local site. One downside I see with ADBPA is that it cannot be self-launched into its separate MMC. Or unlike the Exchange BPA, it is only accessible in a small window from within the Server Manager. So there if is large number of non-compliant/compliant messages, the browsing ability is not that great.

How does ADBPA gather this data ?

“When you run the AD DS BPA scan on a domain controller, the BPA engine invokes the AD DS BPA Windows PowerShell script that collects configuration data from the AD DS environment that this domain controller belongs to. The AD DS BPA Windows PowerShell script then saves the collected AD DS configuration data to an XML document. The BPA run-time engine validates this XML document against the XML schema.”

For more information on ADBPA. See this.

It is version 47 in RC and it may very well change when R2 gets RTM. You can check the objectVersion attribute of your current forest on the Schema Naming Context (NC) via ADSIedit.msc.

Here are some older Schema versions.

13=Win2k
30=2003
31=2003R2
44=2008

Here is more detail of schema changes in Windows Server 2008 R2 RC.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd378828(WS.10).aspx

Who needs ADRAP or ADHC when you have this in front of you. This is a modification of “Good code, Bad code” by the author credited on the picture.