Lessons Learned in Novell Edirectory to AD Migration

The synchronization tool and FMU work great as long as you don't have duplicate names or groups in multiple OUs. You can make the mistake I did and 2 way synchronize at the OU level. This created multiple admins on the AD side called admin, admin0, admin1 etc. This is not good when you go back in and clean it up. 2 way synchronization means just that and deleting the admins from AD deletes them from Edirectory.

In addtion, if you do not move all the users and groups, you will not move all the permissions. So dont forget to combine all your FMU logs into one or else you have a whole lot of permissions to manually apply.

Sometimes if there are minimal permissions it is actually easier to connect to the share and just copy the folder instead of using the FMU tool.

You can setup UNC paths to mimic old embedded UNC paths using DNS and the registry. It is a bit tricky.

First to resolve this problem in Windows Server 2003, complete the following steps:

1. Create the CNAME record for the file server on the appropriate DNS server, if the CNAME record is not already present.
2. Apply the following registry change to the file server.
3. Start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe).
4. Locate and click the following key in the registry:
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\LanmanServer\Parameters
   On the Edit menu, click Add Value, and then add the following registry value:
   Value name: DisableStrictNameCheckingData type: REG_DWORDRadix: DecimalValue: 1
5. Quit Registry Editor.
6. Restart your computer.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;281308

Simple right? Not so much.

1. You don't need a cname, you need a new host name. Use the old host name and point it to the new server IP. ie newserver 192.168.1.20 old name old_server 192.168.1.20
2. You need to check the Advanced TCPIP settings of the LAN card, on the DNS tab check to make sure "Append primary DNS Suffix..." is checked off and not "Append these DNS suffixes in order"
3. You need to reboot the client that is trying to connect to the old UNC which points to the new share.
4. You need to apply more reigistry changes. http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?kbid=829885
5. Locate and then click the following registry key on the file server:
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Dnscache\Parameter
6. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click Multi-String Value.
7. Type AlternateComputerNames, and then press ENTER.
8. On the Edit menu, click Modify.
9. In the Value data box, type the fully qualified DNS names of the old servers.
10. This action registers the names in DNS. Each server name must be on its own line. For example, type:
    oldserver1.contoso.com
    oldserver2.contoso.com
    oldserver3.contoso.com
11. Make sure to ype the old server name as well as the new or else it will not work.
12. Click OK.
13. On the file server, follow these steps to configure the OptionalNames registry value:
14. Locate and then click the following registry subkey:
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\lanmanserver\parameters\
15. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click Multi-String Value.
16. Type OptionalNames, and then press ENTER.
17. On the Edit menu, click Modify.
18. In the Value data box, type the NetBIOS names of the old servers (oldserver1, oldserver2, and oldserver3) each on their own line, and then click OK.
19. Reboot server and client.