Domain Controller Required?

[people3]

HI,

Just after opinions really

We are starting a company of approximately 20 people, we will not have a head office (all home workers). All email will be via a hosted exchange and SharePoint for files (fully backed up and archived to second site)

I am aware of the issues of hosting all our information in the cloud, but more and more small companies are starting to do this.

At what point do people feel that a domain controller would be
required
Many Thanks

 

[58sniper]

but more and more small companies are starting to do this.

That's NEVER a reason to do it. Do it because it makes sound technical, administrative, and fiscal sense.

Implementing a DC might complicate authentication to your cloud provider. You should check with them.

I'd look at whether the workstations were personally owned or business owned, and whether you need to push corporate IT policies, such as software or configuration, to the end users. Also, will they need to connect to any non-cloud business resources?

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[people3]

Thank for the reply,

fair point about the other companies comment.


We don't need any policies pushing our or any other non cloud resources as we don't have a fixed office.


It all works on paper, I’m just a little nervous about this as traditionally we would have setup controllers, exchange, terminal servers etc.

 

[itsp1965]

Odds are if you are leveraging a shared Sharepoint and Exchange infra on your cloud provider network, they must be already using AD to begin with.

 

[kmcferrin]

Are you using Office 365 then for the Exchange/Sharepoint hosting? If so then you can manage all of the user accounts and privileges via O365 and you shouldn't need a DC, unless your company will own and manage the desktop/laptop PCs and need to push policies to them, report on them, etc. If so, then you will want a DC and perhaps some management tools and you'll have to connect to O365 via Active Directory Federation Services.

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[people3]

Hi Everyone,

thanks for the comments - we will give it a whirl without AD as we will be on office 365

Many Thanks