Best Practice Active Directory Design for Managing Windows Networks

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Summary

A structured approach makes an enterprise-scale directory service deployment straightforward and easy to understand. This guide and its companion guide, Best Practice Active Directory Deployment for Managing Windows Networks, helps you minimize the time and effort required to implement Active Directory™ directory service in your organization.

This guide provides a step-by-step methodology based on best practices learned from customers that have already deployed Active Directory in their organizations. It provides all the tasks and decisions you need to develop an Active Directory design to manage Windows networks. The intended audience for this guide is the IT professional responsible for testing, piloting, and rolling out an Active Directory design.

Contents

Determining the Number of Active Directory Forests

Before the Active Directory design can begin, an organization must determine if the entire organization can participate in a single forest. For some organizations, certain divisions may require autonomy or be unable to cooperate in a global forest. This section of the design document will assist you in making the determination if pursuing a single forest for your organization will seriously delay your Active Directory deployment.

Designing an Active Directory Forest

After you have achieved consensus among all stakeholders in the forest, you can proceed with the Active Directory design. This section of the design document will assist you in:

• Designing your Active Directory domains in a way that minimizes the number of domains that the organization will need to create and support.
• Designing your DNS design in a way that integrates with any existing DNS service, regardless of its design, and supports Active Directory.
• Designing your organizational units in a way that produces a standard organizational unit structure for delegating administrative authority.
• Designing your site topology in a way that minimizes the configuration effort and that supports efficient Active Directory replication.