Now it's Domain Forests, Domain Trees and Child Domain Controller Forests with their Domain Trees, nestled within larger Domain Forests. The first domain controller installed in a Windows 2000 network creates a new Domain Forest. Bi-directional transitive trusts and replication are automatically implemented when new domain controllers are added to the forest via Active Directory. All domain controllers within the forest maintain a hierarchy of contiguous name space. Since Windows 2000 networking relies on a hierarchy of contiguous domain name space, some planning of your WAN is advisable.
Many corporations use departmental or location schemes.
Naturally, you would choose whatever domain and server names you would like, or use your existing domain name presence on the Internet. In creating a WAN using Windows 2000 Server, I would not recommend using a broadband DSL or Cable connection, only a fully secure T1, T3, OC3 or faster backbone connection with static IP's. Active Directory is used for replication of computer accounts, user accounts, securities, permissions, DNS Services for computer and domain name resolution and Server Management, just to name a few. Don't even try this if you have dynamic IP addresses or if your servers have different network ID's. Hardware Compatibility, Partitioning and File System.