Hello, in the TechNet site documentations about Active Directory, there is always a note stating that "In Windows 2000 Server and Windows Server 2003, the directory service is named Active Directory. In Windows Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 R2, the directory service is named Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS). The rest of this topic refers to Active Directory, but the information is also applicable to Active Directory Domain Services. " or vice versa. Does this mean that AD and AD DS are the same but are named differently in different systems? If so, does the name AD DS also apply for Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2 and further versions? It's not stating there. Although the documentations were updated in 2014.
On the other hand, in other documentations of Active Directory, e.g. Wikipedia, it seems to me that AD DS is one service that AD offers, which also includes other services such as AD LDS, AD CS, AD FS, etc.