Recycle Bin
Active Roles builds on Active Directory Recycle Bin, a feature of Active Directory Domain Services introduced in Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2, to facilitate the restoration of deleted objects. When Recycle Bin is enabled, Active Roles makes it easy to undo accidental deletions, reducing the time, costs, and user impact associated with the recovery of deleted objects in Active Directory.
The use of Active Roles in conjunction with Active Directory Recycle Bin helps minimize directory service downtime caused by accidental deletions of directory data. Recycle Bin provides the ability to restore deleted objects without using backups or restarting domain controllers and a user interface featured by Active Roles expedites locating and recovering deleted objects from Recycle Bin. Flexible and powerful mechanisms provided by Active Roles for administrative tasks delegation, enforcement of policy rules and approvals, and change tracking ensure tight control of the recovery processes.
To undo deletions, Active Roles relies on the ability of Active Directory Recycle Bin to preserve all attributes, including the link-valued attributes, of the deleted objects. This makes it possible to restore deleted objects to the same state they were in immediately before deletion. For example, restored user accounts regain all group memberships that they had at the time of deletion.
Active Roles can be used to restore deleted objects in any managed domain that has Active Directory Recycle Bin enabled. This requires the forest functional level of Windows Server 2012, so all the forest domain controllers must be running Windows Server 2012. In a forest that meets these requirements, an administrator can enable Recycle Bin by using the Active Directory module for Windows PowerShell in Windows Server 2012. For more information about Active Directory Recycle Bin, see What’s New in AD DS: Active Directory Recycle Bin in the Microsoft Windows Server 2008 documentation.
Finding and listing deleted objects
Once Active Directory Recycle Bin is enabled in a managed domain, Active Roles provides access to the Deleted Objects container that holds the deleted objects from that domain. In the Active Roles Console tree, the container appears at the same level as the domain itself, under the Active Directory node. If multiple managed domains have Active Directory Recycle Bin enabled, then a separate container is displayed for each domain. To tell one container from another, the name of the container includes the domain name (for example, MyDomain.MyCompany.com - Deleted Objects).
Search pages in the Active Roles Console facilitate finding deleted objects, enabling the use of very specific queries based on any object properties. It is also possible to examine and search a list of deleted objects that were in a particular Organizational Unit or Managed Unit at the time of deletion.
Searching the Deleted Objects container
The Active Roles Console offers the Deleted Objects search category in the Find dialog, which is intended to perform a search in the Deleted Objects container of any managed domain where Active Directory Recycle Bin is enabled.
To search the Deleted Objects container
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In the Console tree, right-click the Active Directory and click Find.
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In the Find list, click Deleted Objects.
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Do any of the following:
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In Name or Description, type the name or description, or part of the name or description, of the object to find.
When searching by name, Active Roles uses ambiguous name resolution (ANR) to find objects with not only name but also some other properties matching the string you type in the Name box. The properties used for ANR include name, first name, last name, display name, and logon name.
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Click the button next to the Deleted from box and select the object that was the parent of the deleted object you want to find.
By using the Deleted from search option you can find child objects that were deleted from a particular container object.
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Use the Advanced tab to build a query based on other properties of the deleted object to find. For instructions, see Using advanced search options and Building a custom search in the Active Roles Console User Guide.
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Click Find Now to start the search.
When the search completes, the Find dialog displays a list of deleted objects that match the search criteria.
If you double-click an object in the list of search results, the property pages for that object are displayed. If you right-click an object, the shortcut menu displays all the actions you can perform on that object.
Searching for objects deleted from a certain OU or MU
To view and search a list of objects that were deleted from a particular Organizational Unit (OU) or Managed Unit (MU), you can use the View or Restore Deleted Objects command. The command opens a dialog box that lists the deleted objects that were direct children of the corresponding OU or MU at the time of deletion. The View or Restore Deleted Objects dialog can be used to search for deleted objects whose name matches a specific search string. It provides flexible matching by using support for ambiguous name resolution (ANR).
To search for objects deleted from a particular OU or MU
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Right-click the OU or MU and click View or Restore Deleted Objects.
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In Look for, type the search string that you want to use.
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Click Find Now to start the search.
When the search completes, the list in the dialog box is limited to the deleted objects whose name, first name, last name, display name, logon name, or any other property used for ANR begins with the specified search string. To clear the search results and display all the deleted objects, click Clear Search.
NOTE: The View or Restore Deleted Objects command is also available on domain and container objects, which allows you to find deleted objects that were direct children of a particular domain or container at the time of deletion.