{"id":3212,"date":"2023-05-19T09:08:35","date_gmt":"2023-05-19T13:08:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jumpcloud.com\/blog\/?p=3212"},"modified":"2024-01-29T15:25:11","modified_gmt":"2024-01-29T20:25:11","slug":"google-apps-and-active-directory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jumpcloud.com\/blog\/google-apps-and-active-directory","title":{"rendered":"A Better Way to Manage Google Workspace: Cloud Directory vs. Active Directory"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Many IT admins struggle with the balancing act of having one foot in Google\u2019s cloud<\/a> and the other on-prem with Active Directory<\/a> (AD). This article examines the ins and outs of integrating Google Workspace with AD, dissects some common pitfalls, and explores migrating from a hybrid configuration to a cloud-based identity and access management (IAM) infrastructure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Active Directory and Google Workspace<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

AD is an on-prem database that is used to control user access and authentication across various IT resources, including systems, networks, file servers, applications, and more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Google Workspace, formerly G Suite, is a cloud-based suite of productivity tools for businesses to create and collaborate easily. Its cloud-based nature means that organizations can easily adopt it since they don’t need to purchase extra software or hardware to access it. Workspace is a popular alternative to Microsoft 365 and provides optionality<\/a> for IT admins to select a preferred system for IAM and device management. Many organizations already use Active Directory and decide to provision users into Workspace from that system of record.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Active Directory and Google Workspace work great respectively, but weren\u2019t designed to work together. As a result, organizations must select the best method to integrate the systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\n \"JumpCloud\"\n <\/div>\n
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\n Securely connect to any resource using Google Workspace and JumpCloud. <\/p>\n <\/div>\n

\n Learn More<\/a>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n\n

Google Cloud Directory Sync (GCDS)<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Formerly called Google Apps Directory Sync (GADS)<\/a>, GCDS was developed by Google to help bridge the gap between AD and Workspace. It leverages LDAP to sync data with Active Directory and retrieve information about users and groups. Admins can continue to manage users within AD and whatever changes they make are reflected in Workspace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are several considerations to keep in mind with this approach while scoping out your requirements. First, the GCDS and Active Directory sync is unidirectional. Changes made in Active Directory are reflected in Google Workspace, but there\u2019s no writeback to AD. For instance, there\u2019s no password writeback, limiting what\u2019s possible within Google\u2019s console.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

GCDS also contributes to increasing organizations’ “on-prem footprint” and management overhead, which may slow down cloud migration efforts. GCDS requires a dedicated server and active management by IT admins. This translates to more hardware and higher costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lastly, GCDS is purpose-built to connect AD identities to Google Workspace. GCDS x AD cannot be used as a source of truth to manage identities across non-Google tools, nor can it be used on non-Windows platforms. Google provides different integrations for those use cases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Directory Sync<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Directory sync uses an AD account to securely read user and group objects. This eliminates the requirement to manage on-prem hardware and deployments. There may also be more than one AD source (multi-directory), as opposed to GCDS, which syncs a single domain per instance. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Google Workspace works in combination with a Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) access connector to configure syncing. Admins must map the LDAP data structures<\/a> between AD and Google Cloud. Organizational Units (OUs) within AD are organized differently than Google\u2019s folders and projects resource hierarchy. There\u2019s a low bar for knowledge about LDAP, but lifecycle management can become complex when the user state in AD differs from the synced account. Admins are then required to configure safeguards to avoid activating suspended accounts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"LDAP<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Single Sign-On<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Active Directory single sign-on (SSO) is another method to address the Google Workspace x AD integration challenge. SSO works by using Secure Assertion Markup Language<\/a> (SAML), which allows users to use their credentials to access Google Workspace and other web applications. Requirements include using Microsoft Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS<\/a>), which entails setting up a server farm and can be challenging to configure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other considerations include:<\/p>\n\n\n\n