how windows store information

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Win2008

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Hi All,

I am trying to build knowledge in how windows store information about users, machines, installed software, security and authentications and other lots of stuff.

Using c# I can query WMI and Active directory, LAPD and for security also there may be some other namespaces too which will assist you with user roles and its password stuff etc.

I am aware how to query for information, but what difficulty I am finding is which information is present where. I don’t know initial basic knowledge about how and where information is stored.

I don’t have basic knowledge of how information is organized here?

Can anyone help me with this?

Thanks

Posted 21-Mar-12 5:08am

sunder.tinwar

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S@53K^S 21-Mar-12 11:15am

Could you be more clear what sort of information you are looking for.As windows does not store all the items in a single location,but it stores in various locations.Installed S/W can be sought from the REgistry.Authentication from the kernel.So on and so forth.

sunder.tinwar 21-Mar-12 11:23am

Yes I know the question is little vague. But I basically want to know how information is catagorized in windows which a developer can query using c#.

I am working on a project where I have to query different information using WMI and Active directory and even user profile and security based query which I am not aware how to do.

Apart from this I dont have initial knowledge about Active Directory and how user profile is maintained in windows.

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Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov · Answer 1 · 2012-03-21T09:28:00

Quick answer, just to the essence of things: this information is stored transparently to the user:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transparency_%28human-computer_interaction%29[^].

By the way, passwords in their original forms are not stored anywhere at all. That would be way too unsafe. Nobody can possibly learn a password even using full access to the system. And this is never needed for authentication. They are stored in the form of cryptographic hash function (or possibly other cryptographic methods), please see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptographic_hash_function[^].

—SA

fjdiewornncalwe · Answer 2 · 2012-03-21T06:36:00

Solution 1

You may want to start with this article: Howto: (Almost) Everything In Active Directory via C#[^]

Posted 21-Mar-12 6:36am

fjdiewornncalwe

Comments

sunder.tinwar 21-Mar-12 12:40pm

This is just about active directory. But what information do active directory hold and on what OS it will be supported.

How to know user passwords verifications etc...security related stuff. How i can query that.

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 21-Mar-12 15:30pm

This is not quite correct question. Please read my answer and references.
--SA

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 21-Mar-12 15:29pm

Good source, a 5.
I answered on first principles though, I think more to the essence of things. Please see.
--SA