Somehow, accidentally I was trying to look on the properties of a user on Active Directory. Actually I was interested on looking at the Attributes associated with a user. Hence, I opened the Active Directory and selected a particular user. Select the properties. The properties popup came. But, I could not see the Attributes tab on it. The Properties Pane was like below.

Sometimes, we may require some additional attributes to be added on the Active Directory, irrespective of the default fields given by Microsoft. For example, an attribute called Marital Status may not be there by default. But, if a new employee joins our organization, we may gather those information and we want that information needs to be present on the SharePoint portal as well. In that case, it is always better to keep those information on the Active Directory itself. Hence, whenever a synchronization happens, it will fetch the information from the Active Directory itself. This will reduce the time as well as a manual intervention.

But, somehow, I was expecting something like

Initially I was panic about this and later came to a conclusion that, this could be something relevant to the View setting. Hence, I tried one by one with all the options on the View. Later as we suspected, there is a setting on the View only.

1. Go to View and Select Advanced Features

2. Now, we will be able to see all the properties.

Though it looks like very simple, this will definitely save some one’s one hour I guess.

Happy Coding.

Sathish Nadarajan.

In the previous article, we saw how to Create Domain Certificate by using IIS server. Now, let us see, how to create the same Domain Certificate from MMC Console. Because, even if there is no IIS got installed, definitely MMC will be there on any machine. That’s the reason, we need to look into this also.

Though it is easy to create using IIS, we need to know this way also. Sometime it will definitely help.

The steps are as follows.

1. Go Run and type MMC.

2. On the Snapin, select “Add/Remove Snap-in”

3. Select the “Certificate Authority”

4. Certificate Authority will be loaded as shown below

5. Now, again go back to Add/Remove Snap-in and Select Certificates

6. Select the Radio Button appropriately. In my case, am selecting the Computer.

7. Select Local computer. Since am in the CA Server only.

8. Now the console will looks like

9. Select Personal -> All Tasks->Request New Certificate

10. Follow the screen shots.

Select the template

To add more templates to here, we need to add the Templates from the CA. We will see that as Appendix. Now proceed with Enroll.

We will get the Certificate. To confirm that, we can go to IIS-Server Certificates. The created certificate will be listed there also. On the issued certificate section also, we can see the certificate.

Appendix A:

Here let us see, how to add a new template.

We need to select an existing template. New certificates can be inherited from the existing certificate template only.

Now, we are done with the creation.

Happy Coding.

Sathish Nadarajan.

In the previous article, we saw how to install ADCS and convert our Windows Server 2008 R2 into a Certification Authority Server. In this post, let us see, how to use that CA to issue certificate for us.

There are 2 ways to create the certificate using CA. In this article, let us see one through IIS Server.

Approach I – Through IIS:

In this Approach, the same as that of creating a Self-Signed Certificate, we can also create a Domain Certificate as well. Only thing is, Active Directory Certificate services should be installed on the Domain. If it is not properly installed, then we cannot create a Domain Certificate. Though we are able to see the link to Create Domain Certificate from the IIS, we cannot create. Let us see, how we cannot Create first.

Let us go to the IIS Server.

On the Right Pane, we can see the option to Create Domain Certificate. Click that one.

We need to give all the necessary information. Then only Next Button will get enabled.

For documentation purpose, am giving test in all the fields.

When I press Next, the next screen would be

Since, there is no CA installed, we cannot proceed further.

Let us see, if the CA is installed, (the screen shots were taken from a different environment. Hence the name of the servers will not match with the previous ones)

Now, the Certification Authority Selection Button will be enabled.

Select the CA which we installed already.

Give a Friendly Name and click Finish

The certificate got Created.

The major difference, which I thought of explaining is, the “Issued To” field. This field is coming from the Common Name which we gave on the First Screen. For reference, the same is pasted here.

Hence, if we want a certificate against any specific machine, then we need to give the machine name or the full name of the machine (along with the domain) on the Common Name Field. The other fields, doesn’t have much impact.

And much more important difference is renewal.

On the below screen shot,

Only the “Test” is domain Certificate. The remaining 2 are Self-Signed Certificate. To identify them, select and Right click on the Certificate. You cannot find an option for renew. Only Domain Certificates can be renewed. Self-Signed Certificates cannot be renewed.

As I mentioned, there are 2 ways to Create a domain Certificate. In this post, we saw one of the approach. The second approach, we will see in the upcoming posts. Thanks.

Happy Coding.

Sathish Nadarajan.

All of us know the importance of Certificate while in development environment as well in the customer’s environment. Being a developer, we don’t bother about the customer environment’s Certificates. But, while developing itself, we will be required to deal with the certificates frequently. For Example, even for creating a HTTPS site, we require certificates.

Regarding this, we had already seen, how to create a self-signed certificate from IIS in this post. But, the problem which we faced here is, the validity of the Certificate. The default validity of the self-signed certificates are one year. After one year, there is no option to renew or extend the validity. Even I couldn’t see any option for the AutoCertificateRollover also. (We can discuss about them in some other posts.)

At the same time, for the development, we cannot buy any certificate for cost also. At this scenario, if we have a Windows Server 2008 R2 machine (or any other Server OS can help. Since, I used Windows Server 2008 R2, I am explaining about that), we can convert our server into a Certificate Authority Server, and get certificates from that itself. We can renew, and we can choose any templates etc., There are much more options are there.

Let us see how to install the Active Directory Certificate Services first. As usual, the step by step procedure are as follows.

1. Open the Server Manager

2. Select the Roles. And Add Roles.

3. Select the Active Directory Certificate Services

4. The installation Wizard will begin

5. Select the Services. The basic things we require for our need is, Certificate Authority and Certification Authority Web enrollment

6. To install, the Web Enrollment Service, there are certain IIS related Services needs to be installed. Click on Add Required Role Services.

7. Now, go to the next screen

8. Select the Enterprise, since we are going to use the existing Active Directory

9. Select the Root CA. This Certification Authority is going to be the Root for any other sub Certification Authority in future. As for as concerning the development machine, we don’t need to worry about this. We can proceed with Root CA

10. Select the New Private Key

11. The encryption methods. Leave as by default. The only thing to be noted here is the Key Character Length. For a safer side, always keep the length not less than 2048.

12. Give the name of the CA and the Certificate prefixes etc., Mostly keep as it as default.

13. Validity of the Certificate. Give as you require. Even, if you give a lesser value, we can renew the certificate.

14. Location of the database files.

15. Confirm and proceed with installation.

Verifying the Installation.

Once the installation got succeed, we need to verify. To verify that, we can go to Server manager again and see the Roles has been added.

To verify against the Certification Authority, the following steps will help us.

1. Go to Run and type MMC

2. Management Console will open. On that, Add Snapin.

3. Add Certification Authority and select Local.

4. It will get added.

5. Now, you can see the entire certificates which were issued, pending requests, Certificate templates etc.,

We can see, how to create a certificate using this Certification Authority in the consecutive posts.

Happy Coding.

Sathish Nadarajan.