Creating Or Removing A Global Catalog

By Author: fiona
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Global catalogs can be created or removed using the Active Directory become mcts Sites And Services console.

Caution Do not create a global catalog unless you are certain it will provide value in your deployment. For this option to be useful, your deployment must have multiple domains, and even then only one global catalog server is typically useful in each site.

To create or remove a global catalog, complete the following steps:
1.Click Start, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Active Directory Sites And Services.
2.In the Active Directory Sites And Services console tree, double-click the domain controller hosting the global catalog.
3.Right-click NTDS Settings, and then click Properties.
4.In the NTDS Settings Properties dialog box, shown in online MCTS certification, perform one of the following actions:
a To create a global catalog, select the Global Catalog check box, then click OK.To remove a global catalog, clear the Global Catalog check box, then click OK.
For ...
... optimum network response time and application availability, designate at least one domain controller in each site as the global catalog server. A global catalog server in each site provides users with a local computer that can service query requests for their domain over LAN connections. When considering which domain controllers to designate as global catalog servers, base your decision on the ability of your network structure to handle replication and query traffic. Network traffic related to global catalog queries generally requires more network resources than normal directory replication traffic.

The global catalog is the central repository of information about objects in a tree or forest and is created automatically on the initial domain controller in the first domain in the forest, known as the global catalog server. A global catalog server is a domain controller that stores a full copy of all objects in the directory for its host domain and a partial copy of all objects for all other domains in the forest.

Universal group membership caching, a new feature in the Windows Server 2003 operating system, allows a site that does not contain a global catalog server to be configured to cache universal group memberships for users who log on to the domain controller in the site. The universal group membership caching feature must be set for each site and requires a domain MCSE 2003 certification controller to run a Windows Server 2003 operating system.