Active Directory User Group Memberships GroupPrincipal

Question

I am trying to use GroupPrincipal (part of the System.DirectoryServices.AccountManagement namespace) to populate a list of type string, so I can check to see if a user is a member of an Active Directory group. Here is the edited class that I have written so far:

public class ActiveDirectoryMembership
{
    private PrincipalContext context = new PrincipalContext(ContextType.Domain, Environment.UserDomainName);
    private List<string> GroupName {get;set;}

    public ActiveDirectoryMembership() 
    {
         //Code snipped - this part returns a list of users
         populateGroups();
    }

    private void populateGroups()
    {
        GroupPrincipal SearchGroup = GroupPrincipal.FindByIdentity(context, "Group Name");
        GroupName = new List<string>();
        foreach (UserPrincipal p in GroupName.GetMembers())
        {
           GroupName.add(p.SamAccountName);
        }
    }

So, where am I going wrong?

Thanks in advance :)

Answer 1

This modification of your code works (I made tests to ensure):

using System.DirectoryServices.AccountManagement;


    private static readonly string DomainName = "domaincontrollercomputer.domain.com";
    private static readonly string DomainContainer = "DC=DOMAIN,DC=COM";
    private static readonly string ADGroupName = "AD Group Name";
    private List<string> GroupName {get;set;}
      
    private void populateGroups()
    {
        using (var ctx = new PrincipalContext(ContextType.Domain, DomainName, DomainContainer))
        {
            using (var grp = GroupPrincipal.FindByIdentity(ctx, ADGroupName))
            {
                GroupName = new List<string>();
                foreach (var member in grp.GetMembers())
                {
                    GroupName.Add(member.SamAccountName);
                }
            }
        }
    }

Answer 2

I think you have a simple typo in your method - you're getting the group principal into SearchGroup (check for NULL, btw!!) and then you're grabbing the members off GroupName ??

Try this:

private void populateGroups()
{
    GroupPrincipal SearchGroup = GroupPrincipal.FindByIdentity(context, "Group Name");

    if(SearchGroup != null)
    {
       GroupName = new List<string>();

       // call 'GetMembers' on 'SearchGroup' here!! 
       foreach (UserPrincipal p in SearchGroup.GetMembers())  
       {
          GroupName.add(p.SamAccountName);
       }
    }
}