What is System.DirectoryServices?

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If you have developed applications to access Active Directory Domain Services, then you might be familiar with the ADSI and LDAP APIs. System.DirectoryServices offers access to Active Directory Domain Services through the .NET Framework. With System.DirectoryServices, you can write applications that access directory services such as Active Directory Domain Services in managed code in programming languages such as C# and Visual Basic.

In the .NET Framework, classes and properties for directory objects and the methods used to access and manipulate those objects are contained within the System.DirectoryServices namespace. The classes in System.DirectoryServices wrap ADSI functionality, but the naming scheme does not always match its ADSI counterpart.

When you use this guide, look for the task that you want to perform to learn which classes and methods to use. In this way, you will become familiar with the naming scheme used in System.DirectoryServices.

The following diagram shows how the various directory APIs are layered, including the managed code layer.

Managed code

See Also

Reference

System.DirectoryServices
System.DirectoryServices.ActiveDirectory
System.DirectoryServices.Protocols

Concepts

System.DirectoryServices Namespace Overview
About System.DirectoryServices

Other Resources

System.DirectoryServices.ActiveDirectory Namespace Overview
System.DirectoryServices.Protocols Namespace Overview

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