Customer Reviews

Active Directory(TM) Services for Microsoft Windows 2000 Technical Reference (Microsoft Technical Reference)

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This book explains Active Directory in its entirety - and includes a quick but useful overview of how/why Active Directory is such a big deal... which helps you understand the big picture. The book quickly dives into detail about the things you need to know about Active Directory - like Active Directory architecture, DNS details, domain plainning, kerberos security, upgrading from NT4, the schema, and migration... and others. On top of that, the book is an easy read, because the author writes so that it's actually enjoyable. Highly recommended.

No matter your role on an Active Directory deployment team, this is a perfect guide to give you the background info you need, as well as the steps you need to take make your job easier. The author explains concepts easily, and makes you laugh while you learn! After you've read about Win2000 Architecture, DNS, and Security, it will be a breeze to follow along in the Deployment part of the book. Every chapter flows into the next logical chapter, for easier understanding that produces increased confidence and peace-of-mind!

I was an NT 4 Admin for a major Fortune 100 firm and was looking for a better AD book. This was it! Mr. Iseminger broke down some fuzzy relations including DNS, 2000 domain controllers, schemas, and directory services...He also wrote it from NT 4 admins perspective and broke down the issues w/ the domain model and the need for the scalable AD environment...I've always been a Mark Minasi (author) fan but I'll be watching for more books by Isminger in the future!

While the book contains a good amount of planning, overview, and description of AD and it's features, it doesn't contain very much true technical insight.

I also found that the author tends to get unecessarily wordy at times too. In what would normally take a few lines to describe, he circles around the description for several paragraphs and ends up giving a more confusing description than had he just come right out and said it.

While the author is certainly very knowledgeable with the subject matter he tends to forget from time to time that we, the readers, may not be. I purchased this book right around the time that Windows 2000 was coming out -- before being familiar with active directory, and before the hundreds (if not thousands) of TechNet articles came out explaining the directory in detail -- and I found the book somewhat lacking in it's explanation. I use it occasionally as a reference book, however, the Index and style of writing does not lend it to being a quick reference (you usually have to read two or three pages to get to the information you desired). I recommend it, perhaps as a supplement to, or with supplement from the articles on Microsoft's TechNet. It is, however, very well written and enjoyable book to read!

Great book - it does it all, from clarifying how Active Directory works and fits in with everything else in Win2000, to nitty-gritty details and guidance for planning and deploying Active Directory. The background chapter at the beginning helped me figure out why Active Directory is such a big deal, and the book builds from there into a logical progression of chapters that makes the whole book seem more cohesive and understandable. All of my Active Directory questions were answered in this book, as were additional Active Directory and Win2000 questions I didn't even know I should be asking!

This book does an excellent job of intergrating theoretical information with the real world implementations it might take on. If you want a concise explanation of the nuts and bolts of Windows 2000 I would reccomend checking it out. For those interested in schema extentions and programming against ad this book presents an overview of the parts of ad and how they function together. If you are a programmer this book won't suffice as a programming reference. For that you are better off with msdn or a book specifically addressing programming for Ad.

Oh and take into consideration that this book was written in advance of the Active Directory Migration Tool, so you won't see reference to it. Emphasis is on the Cloneprincipal and LDIF.

In my opinion, a must-have for everyone interested in detailed documentation and best deployment and administration practices for Active Directory. The author (David Iseminger) does a great job explaining the various Active Directory topics througout the entire book.

David's unique way of explaining makes reading this book feel like you're sitting in a classroom. Eventhough he covers complex and real-world challenges consultants and engineers alike are faced with when deploying Active Directory solutions, he puts things in a way that are easy for everyone to understand and to put in perspective at the same time.

This book is an excellent source of knowledge that perfectly matched the objective I acquired it for. The language is simple and easy to understand, the analogies plenty and well related to real life, and the layout logical and interesting. Simply put, a marvelous job done for a complex subject of Active Directory.

I would recommend this book to all readers who wish to acquire a solid understanding of Active Directory.

This book is too lightweight to be called a "Technical Reference." For those wanting a technical reference, go to Microsoft's MSDN and white papers. This book is a lightweight regurgitation of all of that. It's a made-for-TV-movie of Active Directory, complete with advertizements. Don't bother.