---
title: "hMailServer 6.2.4: Active Directory account pickers in the Control Panel"
url: https://www.hmailserver.co.uk/topic/28203/hmailserver-6.2.4-active-directory-account-pickers-in-the-control-panel
author: "Progressiverobot"
published: 2026-06-15T04:40:57.000Z
updated: 2026-06-15T04:40:57.000Z
category: "Announcements & releases"
tags: ["release","control-panel","windows","bugfix"]
site: hMailServer Community Forum
---

# hMailServer 6.2.4: Active Directory account pickers in the Control Panel

The Control Panel gained a read-only Active Directory browser, which was the last functional-parity item left from the classic Administrator. The whole product is stamped 6.2.4: the server, the Control Panel window header and About page, and the installer all report the same version.

**Active Directory account pickers**

- `Services/ActiveDirectoryService.cs` enumerates every domain in the current forest from the RootDSE `defaultNamingContext` and the Partitions container's domain crossRefs, so there is no dependency on `System.DirectoryServices.ActiveDirectory`. A domain's users are searched with a single LDAP-escaped `DirectorySearcher` matching `sAMAccountName`, `displayName`, `mail` and `userPrincipalName`.
- It is built on `System.DirectoryServices`, which net8.0-windows resolves from the Windows Desktop shared framework the installer already bundles. On a machine that is not domain-joined it reports the reason instead of throwing.
- Account then Directory carries "Browse Active Directory…". The picked account fills `ADDomain` and `ADUsername` and ticks linked to Active Directory. Distribution-list recipients gained "Add from AD…", which multi-selects accounts and imports their e-mail addresses into the list.
- Validated end to end against a live domain controller (progressiverobot.local): domain enumeration, the all-users query and the name and e-mail filters all returned the expected results.

**Other changes**

- A generic `TargetInvocationException` from the server is now unwrapped and the real cause explained: connect with the server-administrator account, or the server cannot reach its database. That is what produced the misleading "26 settings could not be read" message on the Protocols page over a non-admin connection.
- The vendored MariaDB Connector/C client (`libmysql.dll` and its auth plugins) is staged into the build output by the server post-build step, so MySQL and MariaDB back ends work out of the box.
- The About page carries maintainer and company details.

The Control Panel requires the .NET 8 Desktop Runtime, which the installer bundles and installs silently when missing.

[Full release notes, checksums and signatures](https://www.progressiverobot.com/hmailserver-downloads/)