A. Windows 2000 is the next major release of NT. It is expected to include the following new features:
" New X.500-style directory services called Active Directory. In the active Directory, domain controllers store the entire directory database for their domain. This directory information can be structured to create a hierarchical directory system.
" Active Directory uses DNS as a locator service and supports LDAP queries.
" Distributed File System. DFS, which was an add-on for NT4, enables multiple volumes on different machines (even not Windows NT!) to appear as a single logical volume.
" Support for more than one monitor using new API commands (note that not all video cards are supported).
" Kerberos-style security, which is a MIT developed security protocol and is used for distributed security within a domain tree and is based on passwords and private-key encryption.
Its not pure Kerberos as it implements a 'data authorization field' which is normally left blank but Microsoft are using it but not documenting its proprietary use of the field making its Kerberos implementation incompatible with other implementations.
" Support for Plug and Play based on ACPI.
" Common device driver model, so new drivers can work on both Windows NT and Windows 98.
" Built in Disk Quota software - per user/per volume only.
" Encrypting File System - file encryption on a per file or per folder basis (like compression at present)

Defragmentation