AD Command-Line Tools vs Templates?

Other than if you have a server core installation, what is the value of using the command-line tools as opposed to using the templates? I've done both and find that using the templates for either a single user or multiple users is easier and faster.

Using the command-line i've found to be slower due to ensuring that your commands are correct and that you have not made any typos.

If there is anyone who prefers the command-line method instead please let me know why you think that the command-line method is better.

Thanks

JerryL

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Comments

earweed

I doubt that very many would prefer using command line tools. The main reason I find for using them is to keep them fresh in my memory for when I have to use them.

dynamik

Really? I think you'd be hard-pressed to find many people that feel that way.

If you had to update something for hundreds of users, you think it'd be slower to enter a command than update each one individually through the GUI?

If you had to add a large number of users, you'd rather do each one individually than simply import them from a .csv file?

JerryL

It looks like the only way to create multiple users at one time would be either through the DSADD command or through a third-party application. I would have thought that MS would have a GUI based app that would let you do that rather than only through the command line.

Maybe on the next version of Server...

Thanks for the replies.

earweed

dynamik wrote: »

Really? I think you'd be hard-pressed to find many people that feel that way.

If you had to update something for hundreds of users, you think it'd be slower to enter a command than update each one individually through the GUI?

If you had to add a large number of users, you'd rather do each one individually than simply import them from a .csv file?

OOPS..wasn't thinking about that

My noobishness is showing again....

dynamik

JerryL wrote: »

It looks like the only way to create multiple users at one time would be either through the DSADD command or through a third-party application.

Several older methods: Create Users for Testing Purposes

New and improved with Powershell: Automating User Provisioning with a Windows PowerShell Function

JerryL wrote: »

Maybe on the next version of Server...

No, everything is only going to get more tightly integrated with Powershell from here on out. The newer GUIs are literally just executing Powershell commands.

Lunchbocks

You can add multiple users at a time via the gui in Small Business Server 2003 and 2008. I thought they would have brought that over in Server 2008 but they didn't.

If I can get an excel spreadsheet from someone with the names, I use csvde, otherwise I just hammer them out with dsadd.

RouteThisWay

dynamik wrote: »

Several older methods: Create Users for Testing Purposes

New and improved with Powershell: Automating User Provisioning with a Windows PowerShell Function

No, everything is only going to get more tightly integrated with Powershell from here on out. The newer GUIs are literally just executing Powershell commands.

QFT and so happy about it.

PowerShell is awesome and once I learned it, I wonder how I lived without.

Hyper-Me

In a domain with less than 50 users yeah its easy enough to use the GUI.

When you work in a domain with 60,000 users, you will be SO happy that one line of powershell can make a change on all of those accounts.