Active Directory (AD) is a directory service that runs on Microsoft Windows Server. The main function of Active Directory is to enable administrators to manage permissions and control access to network resources. In Active Directory, data is stored as objects, which include users, groups, applications, and devices, and these objects are categorized according to their name and attributes.
Forest: A forest is the highest level of organization within AD and contains a group of trees. The trees in a forest can also trust each other, and will also share directory schemas, catalogs, application information, and domain configurations.
Lightweight Directory Services: AD LDS is a Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) directory service. It provides only a subset of the AD DS features, which makes it more versatile in terms of where it can be run. For example, it can be run as a stand-alone directory service without needing to be integrated with a full implementation of Active Directory.
Mac clients assume full read access to attributes that are added to the directory. Therefore, it might be necessary to change the access control list (ACL) of those attributes to permit computer groups to read these added attributes.
Primarily, Active Directory helps administrators in managing users and resources across a network. In addition, active directory is mainly structured into three main tiers: domains, trees and forests. A forest is a collection of trees, each of which may contain numerous domains.
Finally, always remember to keep a record of the Active Directory credentials you use during setup to avoid hiccups later on. Active directory is a valuable resource in any organization as it can be integrated with other tools to facilitate a seamless user management across the organization. This guide is meant to help you set it up correctly.
All task settings are saved in a 'task file', allowing for easy repetitive task executions, including command line and scheduling support. For Active Directory user tasks, home directory creation can be automated using Hyena's existing user home directory templates.
This integration enables organizations to use Active Directory to centrally manage users and roles in multiple Oracle databases with a single directory along with other Information Technology services. Active Directory users can authenticate to the Oracle database by using credentials that are stored in Active Directory. Active Directory users can also be associated with database users (schemas) and roles by using Active Directory groups. Microsoft Active Directory users can be mapped to exclusive or shared Oracle Database users (schemas), and be associated with database roles through their group membership in the directory. Active Directory account policies such as password expiration time and lockout after a specified number of failed login attempts are honored by the Oracle Database when users login.
The majority of organizations do not have these complex requirements. Instead, they can use centrally managed users (CMUs) with Active Directory. This integration is designed for organizations who prefer to use Active Directory as their centralized identity management solution. Oracle Net Naming Services continues to work as it did before with directory services.
This type of directory user can connect to a shared schema in the database by being part of a directory group that is mapped to the shared schema (database user). Using shared schemas allows centralized Active Directory management of database users and is the recommended best practices over using exclusive schemas (described next). Even if there is only one user associated with a schema (for example, an administrator responsible for database backup), it is easier to manage adding another backup administrator or removing the existing administrator by making changes only in Active Directory instead of making changes in all associated databases as well.
You cannot grant these administrative privileges through global roles. To authorize an Active Directory user with these administrative privileges, you must map the directory user to a database user (exclusively or with a shared schema) that has the system administrative privilege already granted to the database user account.
You must create an Oracle service directory user in Active Directory, configure the Oracle Database connection to Active Directory, and then depending on the authentication type, configure the database and Active Directory for password, Kerberos, or public key infrastructure (PKI) authentication. Before you map Database users and global roles to Active Directory users and groups, you must ensure that the Active Directory users and groups have been created. You will map the database users and global roles to Active Directory users and groups by using the CREATE USER, CREATE ROLE, ALTER USER, ALTER ROLE SQL statements with the GLOBALLY clause. An Active Directory system administrator must also set up new Active Directory groups with Active Directory users to meet your requirements.
Note also that orclCommonAttribute stores Oracle password verifier for the Active Directory user. This attribute is also used for password authentication by other Oracle products or features such as Enterprise User Security. For security consideration, you should deny everyone except the Oracle service directory user from accessing the orclCommonAttribute property.
Oracle recommends that you use directories for writable files under $ORACLE_BASE, not under $ORACLE_HOME. Starting with Oracle Database 18c, you can optionally set the $ORACLE_HOME directory to be read-only. Hence, you should place the dsi.ora file in a directory that is outside of $ORACLE_HOME to accommodate the dsi.ora configuration for future releases.
Oracle recommends that you use only dsi.ora to identify the Active Directory servers for centrally managed users. If both dsi.ora and ldap.ora are configured in the same database for centrally managed users for Active Directory and are both located in the same directory, then dsi.ora takes precedence over the ldap.ora file. If they are in different directories, then Oracle uses the first one that it finds in the location precedence list above to find the Active Directory server. If the directory server type in the first found dsi.ora or ldap.ora is not Active Directory, then centrally managed users will not be enabled.
You can specify dsi.ora files for individual PDBs in a multitenant database. A PDB-specific dsi.ora will override the common settings in the shared dsi.ora or ldap.ora for that one PDB. Different PDBs can connect to different Active Directory servers for CMU. The dsi.ora file for an individual PDB is located in the same directory as the wallet for that PDB.
When the WALLET_LOCATION parameter in the sqlnet.ora file is set, then the dsi.ora file for an individual PDB will be in the per-PDB wallet in the WALLET_LOCATION_specified_in_sqlnet.ora/pdb_guid/ directory.
When the WALLET_LOCATION parameter in the sqlnet.ora file is not set, then the default wallet location for an individual container in a multitenant database is the $ORACLE_BASE/admin/db_unique_name/pdb_guid/wallet/ directory. For each PDB to use the default wallet location, you must not set WALLET_LOCATION in sqlnet.ora.
Typically, the ldap.ora file is stored in the $ORACLE_HOME/network/admin directory. Usually, the ldap.ora file cannot be in the same directory as the WALLET_LOCATION that is specified in the sqlnet.ora file, unless the WALLET_LOCATION is set to $ORACLE_HOME/network/admin.
To maintain backward compatibility (if your site requires it), the Oracle filter can generate password verifiers to work with Oracle Database clients for releases 11g, 12c, and 18c. The Oracle password filter uses Active Directory groups named ORA_VFR_MD5 (for WebDAV), ORA_VFR_11G (for release 11g) and ORA_VFR_12C (for releases 12c and 18c) to determine which Oracle Database password verifiers to generate. These groups must be created in Active Directory for the Oracle password verifiers to be generated for group member users. These are separate groups that dictate which specific verifiers should be generated for the Active Directory users. For example, if ten directory users need to log in to a newly created Oracle Database release 18c database that only communicated with Oracle Database release 18c and 12c clients, then an Active Directory group ORA_VFR_12C will have ten Active Directory users as members. The Oracle filter will only generate 12C verifiers for these ten Active Directory users when they change passwords with Active Directory (18c verifiers are the same as 12c verifiers). If an Active Directory user no long needs to log in to Oracle databases, in order to clear the Oracle password verifiers generated for the Active Directory user, remove the user from any ORA_VFR groups, and reset the password (or require password change) for this user. You can also manually clear the orclCommonAttribute attribute for this user. Oracle password verifiers will no longer be generated after the user has been removed from ORA_VFR groups.
Most Oracle Database users will be mapped to a shared database schema (user). This minimizes the work that must be done in each Oracle database when directory users are hired, change jobs within the company, or leave the company. A directory user will be assigned to an Active Directory group that is mapped to an Oracle database global user (schema). When the user logs into the database, the database will query Active Directory to find the groups the user is a member of. If your deployment is using shared schemas, then one of the groups will map to a shared database schema and the user will be assigned to that database schema. The user will have the roles and privileges that granted to the database schema. Because multiple users will be assigned to the same shared database schema, only the minimal set of roles and privileges should be granted to the shared schema. In some cases, no privileges and roles should be granted to the shared schema. Users will be assigned the appropriate set of roles and schemas through database global roles. Global roles are mapped to Active Directory groups. This way, different users can have different roles and privileges even if they are mapped to the same database shared schema. A newly hired user will be assigned to an Active Directory group mapped to a shared schema and then to one or more additional groups mapped to global roles to gain the additional roles and privileges required to complete their tasks. The combination of shared schemas and global roles allows for centralized authorization management with minimal changes to the database operationally. The database must be initially provisioned with the set of shared schemas and global roles mapped to the appropriate Active Directory groups, but then user authorization management can happen within Active Directory.
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