C# Looping through an array to create Active Directory OUs

Question

I'm trying to create nested Organizational Units in Active Directory and I'm close to having this working. I have a problem line below that I need help with. I'm checking if an OU exists and if not I need to create it, strOUArray contains OU=Test OU=Test2 and OU=Test3. I need the code to create OU=Test first and then use this as the parent OU on the //PROBLEM LINE below allowing the next OU OU=Test2 to be created inside OU=Test. Currently in the code below all OU's would be created in the root as I don't know how to use the first created OU in //PROBLEM LINE. I've tried using:

parent = new DirectoryEntry("LDAP://" + strOUArray[x-1] + "," + dcSubString); //note x-1

This fails as the parent doesn't exist for the first OU to be created in. Any help really appreciated, I've a tight deadline and just need to move away from this so thank you for any help.

String strOUs = container.Substring(0, container.IndexOf(@",DC="));
int dcIndex = container.IndexOf("DC=");
string dcSubString = container.Substring(dcIndex); //dcSubString = DC=Internal,DC=Net
string[] strOUArray = strOUs.Split(new Char[] { ',' });

for (int x = 0; x < strOUArray.Length; x++)
{
if (DirectoryEntry.Exists("LDAP://" + strOUArray[x] + "," + dcSubString))
 {

 }
else
 {
 DirectoryEntry objOU;
 DirectoryEntry parent = new DirectoryEntry("LDAP://" + dcSubString); //PROBLEM LINE

 objOU = parent.Children.Add(strOUArray[x], "OrganizationalUnit");
 objOU.CommitChanges();
 }
}

Answer 1

Seems like your //PROBLEM LINE is leaving strOUArray[x] out of the string concatenation. Was that a typo when posting?

Also this snippet:

DirectoryEntry parent = new DirectoryEntry();
parent = new DirectoryEntry("...");

You're creating a DirectoryEntry and then immediately throwing away the reference to it on the next line.

Answer 2

Hi Jade,

Well, I guess, I would try to do something like this:

• bind to the top-level first (that's LDAP://
• create the first OU
• then recursively
  • bind to the container just created
  • add the next level down
  • repeat until you're done

Something like this (untested - I don't have a server here to check it out):

String strOUs = container.Substring(0, container.IndexOf(@",DC="));
int dcIndex = container.IndexOf("DC=");
string dcSubString = container.Substring(dcIndex); //dcSubString = DC=Internal,DC=Net
string[] strOUArray = strOUs.Split(new Char[] { ',' });

// create a bind path which we'll build up
string ldapPath = dcSubString;

// bind to the top-level container
DirectoryEntry workEntry = new DirectoryEntry("LDAP://" + ldapPath);

// loop through all sub-OU's to create
foreach(string currentOU in strOUArray)
{
  // add the next OU below the current entry
  objOU = workEntry.Children.Add(currentOU, "OrganizationalUnit");
  objOU.CommitChanges(); 

  // bind to the newly created OU
  ldapPath = currentOU + "," + ldapPath;
  workEntry = new DirectoryEntry("LDAP://" + ldapPath);
}

There's one catch I see: if you create a new OU, you might not be able to bind to it right away - sometimes it takes a moment to propagate into the directory.

Does this help?

Marc

Answer 3

Having run into something similar in the past I created a function that would return the directory object, either newly created or existing (sorry it's in VBScript):

Function GetOU(objParentOU, strOUName)
    On error resume next
    Set GetOU = Nothing

    objParentOU.Filter = Array("organizationalUnit")
    Dim OU : Set OU = Nothing
    For Each OU in objParentOU
        if lcase(OU.Name) = lcase("ou=" & strOUName) then
            wscript.echo "Connected to existing OU: " & OU.Name
            set GetOU = GetObject(OU.adsPath)
            exit function
        end if
    Next
    Set OU = Nothing

    ' If script made it to here then the OU must not already exist
    Set GetOU = objParentOU.Create("organizationalUnit", "ou=" & strOUName)
    GetOU.SetInfo

    if err then
        wscript.echo err.description
        err.clear
    else
        wscript.echo "Created new OU: " & strOUName
    end if
end function

Using this I can build my chain without regard for the OU existing or not. First set the base path and then add on top of that:

Set objDomain = GetObject(LDAP_CONNECTION_STRING)
Set parentOU = GetOU(objDomain, "parentOU")
Set childOU = GetOU(parentOU, "childOU")
Set subchildOU = GetOU(childOU, "subchildOU")

As the code works down the set commands the OU's are either created new or bound-to if they already exist.