Resolution
Why is the Directory and Resource Administrator MMC displaying the same information in both the Name and Logon columns?
fact
Directory and Resource Administrator 6.x
fix
The translation of field names between a Windows NT4 SAM database, a Windows 2000 Active Directory database, and what Directory and Resource Administrator (DRA) displays in its user interfaces can be confusing. There are three names to consider with regard to this subject. They are Common Name, Logon Name/Username and Full Name.
In a Windows NT4 SAM database the Common Name (commonly called the CN name) is the same as the Username. The Full Name of an NT4 account is simply a data field and not used for security identification and authentication. The CN/Username is displayed in the first column and is the default sort in NT4's User Manager for Domains. It is also the name displayed in the title bar while viewing an account's properties page. It is not, however, displayed as an editable field. The Full Name is displayed in a separate column in User Manager for Domains but, unlike the Username, it can be modified from within the user interface.
A Windows 2000 Active Directory (AD) database is somewhat different. In AD, the CN name is the same as the Full name. Active Directory Users and Computers displays the CN/Full name the first column and is the sort order default. As in an NT4 database, the CN is not an editable field in an account properties page. The User logon name (pre-Windows 2000) is the name a user logs on with in an Active Directory environment and is the same as the Username in an NT4 SAM. While it does not do so by default, Active Directory Users and Computers can be configured to display a Username column.
When a Windows NT4 domain is upgraded to Windows 2000, the Full Name field in the NT4 SAM is translated to a new field in Active Directory called Display name. This field serves as a placeholder for the Full Name information from NT4 only and is not used for security identification or authentication. The Full name field in Active Directory is, by default, a combination of the First name and Last name fields when a new user account is created. Because the First and Last name fields do not exist in NT4, the CN/Full name field in AD is populated with the data from the Username field in the NT4 SAM during the upgrade. Because of this, the same information appears in both the Name column and the Logon column in the Directory and Resource Administrator MMC.
Directory and Resource Administrator has the ability to auto-populate the Full name field from the First and Last name fields. It also has the ability to update the Full name field for any number of existing users based on the contents of another field (such as that of the Display name field) or a predefined list of values. These changes appear immediately in the sortable list in both the MMC and Active Directory Users and Computers interfaces. The MMC interface cannot, however, be customized to display other field information in a column.