Domain Level Vs Forest Level

The forest functional level ffl determines the features of active directory domain services ad ds that are enabled in a forest.

Domain level vs forest level. The simplest option is to limit the structure to a single domain but this isn t typically possible at the enterprise level. Suppose when you have set forest and domain. Multiple active directory forest. Under the general tab the domain functional level and forest functional level is displayed on the screen.

When the functional level of a forest or domain within active directory is raised certain set of advanced features become available to the users. In large networks there might be dozens or even hundreds of active directory domains. Forest is a collection of trees or domain trees while the domain is a set of active directory objects. When you deploy an active directory domain service always set the highest value of forest and domain functional level in your environment to get all available features.

Understanding active directory replication. You can set the domain functional level to a value that is higher than the forest functional level but you cannot set the domain functional level to a value that is lower than the forest functional level. Forest and domain functional levels determine their capabilities and the operating system you run on dcs in the domain or forest. From the administrative tools menu select active directory domains and trusts or active directory users and computers.

Today i recognized that it is not easy to find a comprehensive summary table about active directory domain and forest functional levels operating mode on the internet. When the forest level replicates to the pdcs for each domain in the forest the domain level is automatically increased to windows server 2003 domain level. This method has the following advantages. The forest wide level increase is only performed one time.

Option 1 from admin tools.