C

canonical name

The distinguished name, rendered as, root first, delimited with the forward slash (/), and without the LDAP attribute tags (CN=, DC=). For example, "Fabrikam.Com/Users/Jeff Smith".

castle

A small group of computers, on a network, that trust each other and share a common user database.

class

See object class.

class instance

A specific occurrence of a class defined in a directory service schema. For example, user objects with the attributes "Jeff Smith" or "Eva Corets" would represent instances of the user class.

CN

See common name.

collection

A set of directory objects that can be represented using the same data type. In ADSI, you can use the IADsCollection interface to work with collections.

COM

See Component Object Model.

common name

A naming attribute from which an object distinguished name is formed. For most object classes, the naming attribute is the Common-Name. For example, a user object with its cn set to "Jeff Smith" might have a distinguished name of "CN=Jeff Smith,CN=Users,DC=Fabrikam,DC=com".

Component Object Model

A programming model that defines how software components interact regardless of where the components are physically located. See The Component Object Model.

configuration partition

A directory partition that contains replication topology and other configuration data that must be replicated throughout the forest. Every domain controller in an enterprise forest has a replica of the same configuration partition.

container

A directory object that can contain other directory objects. In Active Directory, the schema definition of each object class determines the types of objects that can be containers of instances of the class. See Containers and Leaves and IADsContainer.

content rules

A set of rules that define attributes of class instances stored in a directory service. In Active Directory, the schema definition of each class specifies the mandatory (mustHave) and optional (mayHave) attributes for instances of the class.