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I’m sure that for many of you Active Directory is a mainstay of your day. I know that from my PowerShell perspective, this is a very popular topic for automation. Clearly, IT pros want management tools. So today I want to take a look at a product called Adaxes from Softerra.
Softerra has been in the AD business for a long time. Years ago, I used their free LDAP browser when Windows 2000 came out. In fact, that utility is still freely available today. But I’m going to assume you need a more full-featured solution for managing and automating Active Directory. I won’t have time to cover every feature, but you can download it, and give it a test with a free 30 day trial.
You can install everything on a single server or take what I feel is a more traditional path. I installed the Adaxes Service and web components on a Windows Server 2012 R2 server. On a Windows 10 client, I installed the Service Administration Console and the PowerShell module. Everything installs from a single MSI. You select what you want to install.
Selecting Installation Features (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Setup a new service configuration (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Setup optional web portals (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Installation Summary (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Adaxes program items (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Post installation steps (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Adaxes is designed to meet the Active Directory needs of three different audiences and provides customized interfaces for each. In addition to integrating with Active Directory, you can use Adaxes with other user-centric products like Exchange and Office 365, although I didn’t try any of those features in my test environment.
The Adaxes model (Image Credit: Softerra)
Creating a business rule (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Sample new user rule (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Out of the box scheduled tasks (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Logging Adaxes actions (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
In addition to being able to do just about everything through a web interface as well, the web portals also offer some terrific reporting features.
Reporting via the web portal (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
User management via the web portal (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
In addition to the console and web interfaces, Adaxes ships with a PowerShell module of 39 commands. The syntax of most commands is very similar to the Microsoft Active Directory cmdlets. If you’ve used Get-ADUser, you can use Get-ADMUser.
Using an Adaxes cmdlet (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Creating a new user (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
The Adaxes module also includes a PSProvider and a default PSDrive, much like the PSDrive you get with the Microsoft cmdlets.Exploring the Adaxes PSDrive (Image Credit: Jeff Hicks)
Licensing
Adaxes is licensed in bundles per enabled and unexpired user accounts, starting at $1600 for the first 100 users, and the licenses are perpetual. You also have the option to purchase an annual maintenance and support contract. You can learn more by visiting the purchase page. If you have any questions on licensing or cost, talk to the folks at Softerra. But I have to admit the cost to benefit ratio is pretty compelling. Let's say you run a small shop and your time is worth $50 per hour. That would equate to 32 hours of work effort. There's no way you could build home grown solutions for a fraction of the feature set in this product and the daily management time saved is also considerable. And I didn't even get into the password self-service feature, which depending on your user base, may be worth the price of admission by itself.Cons
I don't have too many concerns about features that are lacking or don't work. If anything, the standard console can be a bit overwhelming between tree controls, icons, and menu choices. I also expect the learning curve to fully take advantage of all features is a bit steep but not without rewards.Pros
There's a lot to like and recommend with this solution. For starters, your domain controllers can remain untouched. No changes are made to your AD schema and nothing is stored in AD. Thus you can safely test the product without having to worry about complex rollback schemes. I'm also a big fan of the business rules and scheduled tasks. I think of these features as force multipliers like in the military. They add extra firepower to common tasks, such as creating a new user account. I like the reporting capabilities, as I know many of you have spent a lot of time struggling to build similar reporting mechanisms. Related to reporting is the logging feature. Now you have a central location for all logged Active Directory related events, provided they were run through the Adaxes service. And finally, how can I not like a product that has a full set of PowerShell cmdlets. Even though the cmdlet coverage doesn't come close to duplicating functionality in the GUI, the cmdlets are easy to use and familiar. The module is listed as version 1.0, so I have to assume cmdlet coverage will increase over time. For example, it would be nice to have reporting cmdlets so I don't have to rely on a web browser.Recommendation
If I had significant Active Directory responsibility, I would definitely be trying this product out. Even more so if I also had to manage user's Office 365 or Exchange accounts. The ability to build workflows and automation to typical management tasks is a very compelling reason to give this a try. If you can carve out the time to get everything configured the way you need it, I think the product will make you a much more efficient and happier administrator. You can learn much more by visiting Softerra Adaxes online. There are demo videos, tutorials and screen shots. Even better there is a live demo, where you can try the product out for free without having to download or install anything. Although allow yourself at least 45 minutes as it takes a bit of time for them to spin up a virtualized environment which is more an issue for their hosting company that Softerra. Disclaimer: On my personal blog, Softerra is a paid advertiser, but this review is based entirely on my own testing, observation and experiences. The opinions are my own, unsolicited and uninfluenced.
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