# Use cases for Amazon Managed Microsoft AD
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With Amazon Managed Microsoft AD, you can share a single directory for multiple use cases. For example, you can share a directory to authenticate and authorize access for .NET applications, [Amazon RDS for SQL Server](http://www.amazonaws.cn/rds/sqlserver/) with [Windows authentication](https://docs.amazonaws.cn/AmazonRDS/latest/UserGuide/USER_SQLServerWinAuth.html) enabled, and [Amazon Chime](https://chime.aws/) for messaging and video conferencing.

The following diagram shows some of the use cases for your Amazon Managed Microsoft AD directory. These include the ability to grant your users access to external cloud applications and allow your on-premises Active Directory users to manage and have access to resources in the Amazon Cloud. 

![Use cases for your Amazon Managed Microsoft AD directory like granting your users access to external cloud applications, allowing your on-premises Active Directory users to manage and have access to resources in the Amazon Cloud.](http://docs.amazonaws.cn/en_us/directoryservice/latest/admin-guide/images/ms_ad_use_cases2.png)


Use Amazon Managed Microsoft AD for either of the following business use cases.

**Topics**
+ [Use Case 1: Sign in to Amazon applications and services with Active Directory credentials](usecase1.md)
+ [Use Case 2: Manage Amazon EC2 instances](usecase2.md)
+ [Use Case 3: Provide directory services to your Active Directory-aware workloads](usecase3.md)
+ [Use Case 4: Amazon IAM Identity Center to Office 365 and other cloud applications](usecase4.md)
+ [Use Case 5: Extend your on-premises Active Directory to the Amazon Web Services Cloud](usecase5.md)
+ [Use Case 6: Share your directory to seamlessly join Amazon EC2 instances to a domain across Amazon accounts](usecase6.md)