Customer Reviews

Active Directory For Dummies

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Doing Active Directory right was important to my small technology company, so I bought more than ten books on Active Directory, Windows 2000 Server, and DNS. This Dummies book I took home and planned to skim through it first, thinking it would be a nice quick introduction.

The book got mislaid, and I did not pick it up again until I was nicely up to speed with Active Directory and had done several installations. I read it anyway on a Saturday night as a quick review and was surprised at the clear style, nice organization, and adequacy of its coverage of the subject matter.

If you have just a day or two to get up to speed with this important new Microsoft technology, this book will certainly do. System administrators and architects will want a more technical treatment.

One of my students told me about this book and brought it to class. I hadn't expected so much technical content from a Dummies book. This little book really should be the starting point for anyone interested in Active Directory.

The fantastic complexity of Windows 2000 Active Directory almost makes the title of this book an oxymoron. Win2K presents a huge paradigm shift to network administrators, since the Active Directory is a completely new, radically different beast from what Windows NT was. Understanding AD and how it works takes patience...it isn't accidental that there are 1000+ page books out there on setting up and maintaining an AD infrastructure. This book doesn't aim to help you do specific tasks in AD, but what it does very well is explain in basic terms what AD is and does, how it it structured, and give you the frame of reference you need before you delve further in. But I'm not sure how many people need to [pay] for this book when there are other books out there that deal much more extensively in the workings of AD. The bottom line is that computer enthusiasts curious about the central feature of Win2K and newbie administrators of Win2K who have little or no experience with NT4 will find it a useful primer on AD. For anyone else, it's probably better to put the [money] toward one of the more detailed, albeit less plainspoken, AD guides.

The book Active Directory for Dummies is easy to read without sacrificing technical content. The author gives practical advice on how to implement and use active directory, not just technical description of the product. Worth the money.

I got this book free at the EDS booth at the Windows 2000 launch in San Francisco. I didn't expect it to be this good. It's described as entry-level to Active Directory, but there is a lot of good technical stuff. I recommend it.

When Microsoft took an elegant simple schema from UNIX and redesigned it into a convoluted might mare called "Active Directory" it was time for this book. Turns out that "Active Directory" is not active or a directory; who would have guessed? Well this book starts you off with correcting concepts and even lets you know that with the new terminology that the definition of "domain" has been changed.

A lot of time Dummies books are too busy being cute; this one however is so packed with helpful information that it does not have time to be cute. This book takes you from ground zero to up and running while helping avoid common pit falls.

I like this book, very easy to follow and great tool for beginers like me!!! I found the first two chapters a bit slow but as you progress it gets more complex but still easy to understand!

Great book to get you started on Active Directory.
All the basics are covered, in a fun and easy read.
Well worth the money!

Nice general overview in to the Administrator's world. If you're looking for basic techie commands this is not the book for you. This book is for theory of AD design and deployment. If you're looking for a quick down and dirty how do I book you are better off spending your money on the Active Directory cook book"

This was a "why not?" read.

I was surprised to find it a decent introduction to Active Directory. It mainly deals with the background information as it attempts to explain what is Active Directory.

This is not really an AD management book. If you are looking for a "How to" book, this book will not serve your needs. The information is rather basic at best.

There is discussion about the AD schema which might bore a few people but it is useful if you want to get a feel for the guts of AD. I might add; I really haven't had much of a need to dive into the schema as of yet. Had one instance of extending the schema but that was about it.

One thing that is lightly discussed is AD's use of DNS. Many problems tend to be DNS related and it's not discussed much.

There are dated chapters such as upgrading from NT 3.5 or 4.0 and it talks about why you should use AD. These can be skipped.

The chapter on troubleshooting is pretty basic and not really of much use.

The chapter containing links is old. Some no longer work and some have changed due to company renames, etc.

Overall, it's not a book to get a feel for AD. It is becoming dated especially with 2008 being out. But as a cheap introduction it's pretty good.