Configure People Picker Settings in SharePoint 2013

The Problem is “If a web application is using Windows authentication and the site user directory path is not set, the People Picker control searches all the Active Directory to resolve users' names or find users, instead of searching only users in a particular organizational unit (OU).” Microsoft TechNet site said.

Below is the PowerShell and stsadm commands to Retrieve Users from a Specific OU in Active Directory:

Get current user account directory path for all Site Collections in a Web Application:

Get-SPSite -Limit All | Select Url, UserAccountDirectoryPath 

Get current service account directory path:

stsadm -o getproperty -url http://ServerName -pn peoplepicker-serviceaccountdirectorypaths 

Set service account directory path:

stsadm -o setproperty -url http://contosto -pn "peoplepicker-serviceaccountdirectorypaths" -pv "OU=Contoso-Admin,DC=Contoso,DC=com" 

Configure settings for Web Application (All Site Collections in  a Web Application):

$WebApp = "http://WebApp"

Get-SPWebApplication $WebApp | Get-SPSite -Limit All |ForEach-Object { Set-SPSite -Identity $_.Url -UserAccountDirectoryPath "OU=Contoso-Users,DC=Contoso,DC=com" }

Configure settings for a Site Collection:

Set-SPSite -Identity "http://Contoso/SiteCollection" -UserAccountDirectoryPath "OU=Contoso-Users,DC=Contoso,DC=com"

Restore Default settings for a Site Collection:

Set-SPSite -Identity "http://Contoso/SiteCollection" -UserAccountDirectoryPath ""

Useful links:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/gg602075(v=office.15).aspx

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc263012(office.12).aspx

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc263328(office.12).aspx

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/microsoft.sharepoint.administration.sppeoplepickersettings_properties(v=office.15).aspx

http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/sharepoint/en-US/64670c46-92bd-4858-b383-3167301b3788/useraccountdirectorypath-for-restricting-users-seen-in-people-picker

http://blog.hompus.nl/2011/01/17/configure-people-picker-over-a-one-way-trust-using-powershell/

http://blogbaris.blogspot.com/2011/10/limiting-sharepoint-people-picker-with.html

http://get-spscripts.com/2010/09/restrict-site-collection-users-to.html

http://sharepointserver-2007.blogspot.com/2008/10/limiting-sharepoint-people-picker.html