Finding a server / service in a Windows environment?
UDDI is for finding services on the Internet. Is there something similar for finding services in an enterprise or corporate environment? For example, I want my program to be able to find a central reporting or policy server without configuration. Is this something I can do with Active Directory? Or do I need to do something else?
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The best approach is to use DNS; Microsoft uses it on Windows. For example, _ldap._tcp. will give you all LDAP servers (i.e. all domain controllers) in the domain. If the service is only guaranteed on one host, use A records. If the service is being replicated, use SRV records, explicitly choosing the service for clients (indeed, _ldap._tcp and _kerberos._tcp are stored as SRV records).
There is AD / LDAP support for the selected types of services. For example, COM / RPC servers can be located in AD via the rpc server and related AD classes; RpcNS API (RPC Naming Service)
Winsock has a Register and Permit (RnR) API that uses the AD service class.
Perhaps any of these benefits depends in part on whether you can establish company policy on how services should be located. There are various technologies, many of which are useful, and more importantly, there is one choice (or several alternatives) than using the "better" technology.
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