Active Directory Cookbook

3.20. Finding the Domain Controllers or Global Catalog Servers in a Site

Problem

You want a list of the domain controllers or global catalog servers in a specific site.

Solution

Using a graphical user interface

1. Open the Active Directory Sites and Services snap-in.

2. In the right pane, expand the site that contains the domain controller.

3. For the list of domain controllers, expand the Servers container.

4. To find the global catalog servers, expand each domain controller, right-click on NTDS Settings, and select Properties.

5. Global catalog servers will have the box checked beside Global Catalog.

Using a command-line interface

The following query finds all domain controllers in specified site.

> dsquery server -site <SiteName>

To find only the global catalog servers in a site, use the same command with the -isgc option.

> dsquery server -site <SiteName> -isgc

Using VBScript

' This code prints the domain controllers in a site and then
' prints the global catalog servers in the site
' ------ SCRIPT CONFIGURATION ------
strSite   = "<SiteName>"       ' e.g. Default-First-Site-Name
strForest = "<ForestDNSName>" ' e.g. rallencorp.com ' ------ END CONFIGURATION --------- set objRootDSE = GetObject("LDAP://" & strForest & "/RootDSE") strADsPath = "<LDAP://cn=servers,cn=" & strSite & ",cn=sites," & _ objRootDSE.Get("configurationNamingContext") & ">;" strFilter = "(objectcategory=ntdsdsa);" strAttrs = "distinguishedName;" strScope = "SubTree" WScript.Echo "Domain controllers in " & strSite & ":" set objConn = CreateObject("ADODB.Connection") ...