Mac OS X Lion Server For Dummies®

Chapter 7

Integrating Open Directory with Active Directory

In This Chapter

• Understanding Active Directory and Open Directory integration
• Connecting a Mac OS X Lion server to Active Directory
• Leveraging Active Directory user and computer information
• Setting up Mac clients to be managed by Active Directory
• Configuring Open Directory to utilize Active Directory single sign-on
• Solving problems

Microsoft Active Directory is a fact of life for most corporate networks. Sure, having a homogeneous Macintosh world would make life easier. But the reality is that most corporate and education networks are largely Microsoft territory. Fortunately, you can provide native services to Mac clients within a larger Windows network.

Apple provides every Mac with an LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) plug-in and an Active Directory plug-in that allows a Mac to receive authentication from Active Directory. The plug-ins also enable the Mac to access information from Active Directory, allowing for single sign-on. However, the plug-ins alone don't provide the wealth of Access Directory policy features that enable administrators to set policies that enable the management of dozens or hundreds of computers at a time.

This is where Mac OS X Server comes in. Using Lion Server, you can truly integrate your Mac clients into Active Directory and provide other features.

One of the great things about Apple's implementation of Open Directory services is that your Active Directory administrator doesn't ...