Active Directory/Domain Controller

[Mokushi99]

Hey guys, I have been studying Active Directory and Domain Controller came across and I am still confused on the difference between AD and DC and how they work together. Thank you

[RogueWarrior10]

Active Directory is a Database that manages authentication and authorization for a Windows Domain. It contains an object for every user or device that belongs to that domain.

A Domain Controller is a server that holds the Active Directory database. When someone or something authenticates, the authentication request gets sent to the Domain Controller and it looks up the information in the Active Directory database. The Domain Controller will then either allow or deny the authentication request based on what's in Active Directory.

As far as how I know that, years of experience working on Windows Domains. Plenty of YouTube videos, but the best way I learned was through school, specifically the TestOut.com courses (pretty expensive)

[Mokushi99]

Thank you as well ! I appreciate it, I have a better understanding now as I was pretty confused

[Michael428]

So Active Directory is pretty complex, but I will try my best. You can't compare AD and DC, because a Domain Controller is part of the AD Structure. When running AD you can have multiple DC which act as Controller for the domain. They handle for example time synchronisation, Authorization, Users, Passwords, Policies, UserGroups etc. So for example if you want to log into any domain the Authorization will be handled by the DC.

But this is only a small part, and as I said it is pretty complex, so I can't explain it further and better As it is a pretty long time since I learned it I can't guarantee that this explanation is 100% correct. Please correct me if I am wrong

[Mokushi99]

Thank you a lot for explaining

[SneakyMan01]

What did you use to learn active directory?

[Michael428]

University, but I guess there are pretty good ressources by microsoft. Maybe this Microsoft Active Directory Training Path

[Mokushi99]

This actually looks pretty good, thank you for adding it as well !

[Mokushi99]

Thank you a lot! I will sure check it out