Renaming a DFS target

[jkf1024]

We have a DFS between targets at 2 sites, call them \\server1.domain.com\d$
and \\server2.domain.com\d$. There are several GB of data on d$.

Server 2 needs to be renamed. Let’s call it Server 3. What are the
implications regarding replication/synchronization? The data on server2\d$
will stay the same, only the server name is changing. Can I rename the server
then go to the DFS console and add the target \\server3.domain.com\d$ and
then remove the target \\server2.domain.com\d$?

Or do I need to completely recreate the DFS from scratch? If that is the
case, will a full resynchronization occur? Will it generate a significant
amount of traffic? Is there a better way to do this?

Thanks for any advice here.

[Rudolf Meier]

Hi

Well, I think you have to do it almost like you described it. But I'd
recommend to first remove the old target and then rename the server and add
the "new" target... and if you want to prevent that your replication set is
deleted, you could stop the replication by not allowing replication at any
time (timetable for replication), then add a share on a 3. server and at the
end (after renaming and adding your first server again) remove this 3.
server again.
And the replication will then behave like if you added a new and until then
unknown server. So, in a way there will be a "full resynchronization", but
DFS-R is fast and does only compare the files instead of completely
re-transfer them. So, it shouldn't take that long. When I moved files from
one server to an other it didn't run very long for about 30k files and 80 GB
(at least it took less than 5 hours, that's all I can say and ... well, it
worked without problems).

I hope this helps...

Rudolf

[DaveMills]

I think I would
a) disable referral to server2
b) remove the replication group
c) wait for the message in event log saying that replication group had be
removed and it was safe to delete server 2
d) rename the server
e) add the new link and enable replication.
Let DFS replication resolve to duplication issues. Hopefully it will do this OK

Test on a small data set.

Above all do NOT delete the replication target folder content before the event
log says it is safe to do so or you may find both replication partners do the
delete and zip goes all the data.

--
Dave Mills
There are 10 type of people, those that understand binary and those that don't.