Phonebook database application
The phonebook data is stored in a Jet-engine (MS-Access) database. The database can be found at the location
.\Example Projects\Automation\PhonebookConnector\PhoneBook.mdb
relative to the UMRA Console directory. The database holds a single table, Accounts.
Figure 1: Phonebook database shown with MS-Access
The fields of the Accounts table are:
| Field name
|
Example
|
Usage
|
ID
|
3
|
Unique identification of the table row, used only by the database.
|
FirstName
|
John
|
First name of the user account.
|
LastName
|
Smith
|
Last name of the user account.
|
AccountID
|
643521
|
Unique identification of the employee, as used in the phonebook application and Active Directory. This field corresponds with the LDAP attribute employeeID of each Active Directory user account.
|
Sex
|
F(emale) or M(ale)
|
NA
|
Department
|
Sales
|
NA
|
PhoneNumber
|
382-517-730
|
The phone number of the employee. This field is available in the database and in Active Directory. Changes made to the phone numbers in the database must be propagated to Active Directory by the UMRA synchronization process.
|
Table 1: The fields of the phonebook database table Accounts
In practice, the database query used to access an HR-system database can be very complex. In this example scenario, the query is simple and just returns the required fields of the table shown. The result of such a query should always result in the following fields:
An identification field to uniquely identify the user account e.g. employee in both the HR-system and the directory service. In this case, the database field for this purpose is AccountID. In Active Directory, this field corresponds with LDAP attribute employeeID (this is a so called "free attribute"). In a different scenario, the user name (SAM account name) could be used for this purpose.
The fields used to compare the data of the various systems: the phonebook application and Active Directory. In this example scenario, the database fields FirstName, LastName, AccountID, and PhoneNumber are used to compare the data and eventual create and delete a user account. In practice, more fields will be used, but the idea is always the same.
In this example scenario, the data contained in the phonebook database is leading, e.g. changes in the database must be detected and propagated to Active Directory.
| 
