To get the most out of the book, it helps to have basic knowledge of Windows Server and Active Directory.
Many recipes are written to lift an aging Active Directory environment to new heights. It helps in these cases to know the old protocols, such as NT Lan Manager (NTLM), but an open mind is a more valuable asset when engaging with the recipes.
Some recipes in this cookbook require significant hardware, so if you're staging changes in development, test, or acceptance environments, make sure you have the computational power and storage to do so.