在CRM Dynamics 2011中查询Active Directory

Question

I would like CRM to query the active directory and return all the results it finds for, say, "first name". so, for example: I type in 'Tom' on a field, click a search button and it returns the relevant XML for:

Tom.Smith, Tom.Jones, Tom.Tonks, etc.

I've read around and the following code enables me to search against a username, eg 'Tom.Jones'

var oCommand=new RemoteCommand("UserManager","RetrieveADUserProperties");   
if(oCommand!=null)   
{   
  oCommand.SetParameter("domainAccountName","Tom.Jones");   
  var oResult=oCommand.Execute();   
  if(oResult.Success&&!IsNull(oResult.ReturnValue)&&oResult.ReturnValue.length>0)   
  {   
    var firstName = "";   
    var lastName ="";     
    for(
      var oUserXmlDoc=loadXmlDocument(oResult.ReturnValue),
      oNodeList=oUserXmlDoc.documentElement.childNodes,i=0;
      i<oNodeList.length;
      i++      
    )  
    {  
      var oNode=oNodeList.item(i);  
      if (oNode.tagName == "firstname")  
      {  
        firstName = oNode.text;  
      } else if(oNode.tagName == "lastname") {  
        lastName = oNode.text;  
      }  
    }  
  }  
}          

(source: Technocratica )

but it will only return a result if precisely the correct username has been entered.

In effect, I need to query something along the lines of:

  oCommand.SetParameter("domainAccountFirstName","Tom.Jones");

but I don't know what CRM/AD is/are looking for on this front. Does anyone know if there are search terms other than "domainAccountName"?

Answer 1

We had a similar need however we also had extremely high number of users. Our approach involved leveraging CRM by creating a custom “domain contact” entity in CRM and updating the entities nightly. This allowed our end users to use the Quick Find, Views and other tools already in CRM. Best of all, the end user can use wild cards in their searches.

To facilitate this we ended up writing a separate application that queries AD once a night and populates a SQL database. Then we use a custom workflow step called from a reoccurring workflow to query the database and update CRM as needed.

While the goal was to keep large queries against AD from having an adverse impact to our environment, we ended up giving our end users some great tools with only a small amount of code to maintain.

Answer 2

Upon investigation the SetParameter method can only take a limited number of arguments as its first parameter; and none of those arguments enable a developer to search for just a first or last name.

The easiest option (at least, in my situation) therefore was to write an iframe plugin that runs an LDAP request to AD. Bear in mind that the usual domain rules vis a vis XSS etc. apply in this instance. Anyone relatively new to C# will find comprehensive assistance in writing a useful solution here:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/System.DirectoryServices.aspx