I am currently working on a plugin that needs to receive some information from an LDAP/Active Directory using JNDI. That’s why I needed to set up a directory server in a short time and I didn’t want to waste much effort for here.

Luckily for me the Apache Directory Studio saved my day and allowed me to set up everything I needed in a few minutes.

Short and sweet: In this tutorial I’m going to show you how to configure everything you need in your Eclipse IDE and finally how to query the created LDAP server with a tiny java client using JNDI.

You’ll need Java, Eclipse and that’s all ..

• Java Development Kit 6
• Eclipse IDE

First we’re going to install Apache Directory Studio as Eclipse Plugin ..

• Install the plugin using the update site http://directory.apache.org/studio/update/2.x
• You should at least install Apache Directory Studio Apache DS, Apache Directory Studio LDAP Browser and Apache Directory Studio LDIF Editor here .. or just install everything .. it won’t hurt ..
• If you’re totally unfamiliar with installing a plugin in Eclipse, there is a detailed installation guide for you on the Apache Directory Studio Website.

Apache DS Eclipse Plugin Installation

Now we want to create a new LDAP server for development ..

• Open the server view by going: Menubar > Window > Show View > Other > Apache DS > Servers

Creating a new LDAP server in Eclipse IDE

• Rightclick in the server view and select New > New server
• Enter a name for the server e.g. “ldap-devel” and finish
• You should see your new created server in the server view
• Start your LDAP server by rightclick and run .. after a short time the server’s status should have changed to “started”

Viewing the LDAP server status in Eclipse

• If you take a look at the server’s current configuration you’ll see that the server is configured for the host name ldap.example.com

We need a connection for the following data import and to query our directory server

• Just right-click on the server in the server view and select LDAP-Browser > Create a connection and let the IDE switch to the LDAP Perspective
• In the LDAP perspective there’s the LDAP Browser, an outline for the directory structure, the connection and server views and the directory logs

Now we need some data in our directory server – we do not query him for fun! ;)

• We’re going to import some data from an LDIF file .. just copy the following content and save it to a file and open it in the perspectiv. It is important that the last line in the LDIF file is an empty line/newline.

  dn: dc=example,dc=com
  objectClass: domain
  objectClass: top
  dc: example
   
  dn: ou=Users,dc=example,dc=com
  objectClass: organizationalUnit
  objectClass: top
  ou: Users
   
  dn: ou=Groups,dc=example,dc=com
  objectClass: organizationalUnit
  objectClass: top
  ou: Groups
   
  dn: cn=Micha Kops,ou=Users,dc=example,dc=com
  objectClass: inetOrgPerson
  objectClass: organizationalPerson
  objectClass: person
  objectClass: top
  cn: Micha Kops
  sn: Kops
  uid: mkops
  userPassword:: abcdefg
   
  dn: cn=Santa Claus,ou=Users,dc=example,dc=com
  objectClass: inetOrgPerson
  objectClass: organizationalPerson
  objectClass: person
  objectClass: top
  cn: Santa Claus
  sn: Claus
  uid: sclaus
  userPassword:: abcdefg
   
  dn: cn=John Steinbeck,ou=Users,dc=example,dc=com
  objectClass: inetOrgPerson
  objectClass: organizationalPerson
  objectClass: person
  objectClass: top
  cn: John Steinbeck
  sn: Steinbeck
  uid: jsteinbeck
  userPassword:: abcdefg

• In the editor click on Browse and select your current connection
• Then click on Execute LDIF – now we’ve got some more content in our directory and you are able to see it in the Outline view
  

Connecting to the LDAP server in Eclipse

The imported data in the LDAP outline view

Now lets run a sample query for all users using the LDAP Browser’s search feature: Click on Searches > New > New Search …

Querying the LDAP server

Viewing the result of the LDAP query in Eclipse

Now we want to query the directory for existing user using JNDI .. and our program should output

• I’ve created a simple new Java project in Eclipse containing this one class named LdapQuery

  package com.hascode.tutorial.ldap;
   
  import java.util.Hashtable;
   
  import javax.naming.Context;
  import javax.naming.NamingEnumeration;
  import javax.naming.NamingException;
  import javax.naming.directory.Attributes;
  import javax.naming.directory.DirContext;
  import javax.naming.directory.InitialDirContext;
  import javax.naming.directory.SearchControls;
  import javax.naming.directory.SearchResult;
   
  public class LdapQuery {
  	public static void main(String[] args) throws NamingException {
  		Hashtable<String, String> env = new Hashtable<String, String>();
  		env.put(Context.INITIAL_CONTEXT_FACTORY, "com.sun.jndi.ldap.LdapCtxFactory");
  		env.put(Context.PROVIDER_URL, "ldap://127.0.0.1:10389/");
  		env.put(Context.SECURITY_AUTHENTICATION, "simple");
  		env.put(Context.SECURITY_PRINCIPAL, "uid=admin,ou=system");
  		env.put(Context.SECURITY_CREDENTIALS, "secret");
  		DirContext ctx = new InitialDirContext(env);
   
  		SearchControls searchControls = new SearchControls();
  		searchControls.setSearchScope(SearchControls.SUBTREE_SCOPE);
  		NamingEnumeration<SearchResult> enumeration = ctx.search("ou=Users,dc=example,dc=com", "(objectClass=person)", searchControls);
  		while (enumeration.hasMore()) {
  			SearchResult result = enumeration.next();
  			Attributes attrs = result.getAttributes();
  			System.out.println(String.format("User found.. %s, %s", attrs.get("cn"), attrs.get("uid")));
  		}
  	}
  }

• Run the class and you should see the following output

  User found.. cn: Micha Kops, uid: mkops
  User found.. cn: Santa Claus, uid: sclaus
  User found.. cn: John Steinbeck, uid: jsteinbeck

I have put the source from this tutorial on my Bitbucket repository – download it there or check it out using Mercurial:

hg clone https://bitbucket.org/hascode/hascode-tutorials

• Apache Directory Studio
• Oracle.com: Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI)
• JavaWorld.com: LDAP and JNDI: Together forever
• Stefan Seelmann: Setting up an LDAP server for your development environment

I have written another article covering the topic of writing integration tests for LDAP connected applications, please feel free to read: “LDAP Testing with Java: ApacheDS vs Embedded-LDAP-JUnit“.

• 2015-03-30: Formatting fixed, image captions added.
• 2016-07-04: Link to LDAP testing tutorial added.

Tags: active directory, ad, Apache, apacheds, eclipse, jndi, ldap, ldif

This entry was posted on Monday, June 13th, 2011 at 10:51 am and is filed under Development, Java. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.