My Company is about to rollout Windows 2000 Professional across our entire Network. We have a geographically spread Network across the State of New South Wales in Australia. We are currently running only one Domain Controller in Head Office as that is the only site to have NT WS. The backend here is Novell Netware 5.0, we will not be changing to Win2k server in the short term. The question has been raised whether we include in the new image for the PC the connection to the domain controller or not. This raises issues of connectivity across the WAN, the setup of BDC in the regional areas. What are the benefits of connecting into a DC in a Novell Environment, or what do we lose.
All that being said, there is a compromise – have the machines as members of the
domain, but have the users log into local accounts. This allows the machines to
be controlled remotely, and to be administered in a consistent fashion. This
impacts the potential SOE, however, in that it confines our user control to NDS
based tools, acting independently of a domain based user system. Assuming that
the profile and policy tools available with Zen 3 can function fully without
reference to any domain based model, then this may be a viable option. What
needs to be done now is to define full functionality, and research and test in
our environment.
Any Advice would be appreciated.