[AceJohnny2]

Oof. On the other hand...

> The active directory domain was a .local domain

.local is a reserved domain for mDNS (aka ZeroConf or Bonjour, the stuff Avahi handles), standardized in early 2013.

Then again, 2014 is soon enough after for that for knowledge not to have percolated everywhere, and/or for it to stomp on older networks that had used .local beforehand.

[fanf2]

Microsoft recommended using .local for active directory domains since the 1990s, I think because back then it was not reasonable to demand that their customers register a domain name at a time when that was a massive hassle. But it was still wrong to squat on a TLD: there were already moves to expand the number of TLDs at the time, but MS were very slow to correct their mistake.

Then Apple made the same mistake with Bonjour / mDNS, and the IETF standardized Apple’s use of .local and it all became an even worse mess.

[yencabulator]

I've seen consultants set up ActiveDirectory as "companyname.ad", as if Andorra didn't exist.