Use dfsrdiag on several files and if it returns the same hashes, then it's safe to assume that all other files were restored correctly too. In the ADSIEDIT.MSC tool, modify the following DN and two attributes on the domain controller you want to make authoritative (preferably the PDC Emulator, which is usually the most up-to-date for sysvol replication contents): Modify the following DN and single attribute on all other domain controllers in that domain: Force Active Directory replication throughout the domain and validate its success on all DCs. To manage DFS Replication from other versions of Windows, use Remote Desktop or the Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 7. If setting the authoritative flag on one DC, you must non-authoritatively synchronize There will also be connectivity errors noted in the DFS Replication event log that can be harvested using MOM (proactively through alerts) and the DFS Replication Health Report (reactively, such as when an administrator runs it). To setup only two servers with DFSMGMT, I have to go through all these dialogs: To setup a simple hub and two-spoke environment with DFSRADMIN, I need to run these 12 commands: dfsradmin rf new /rgname:software /rfname:rf01, dfsradmin mem new /rgname:software /memname:srv01, dfsradmin mem new /rgname:software /memname:srv02, dfsradmin mem new /rgname:software /memname:srv03, dfsradmin conn new /rgname:software /sendmem:srv01 /recvmem:srv02, dfsradmin conn new /rgname:software /sendmem:srv02 /recvmem:srv01, dfsradmin conn new /rgname:software /sendmem:srv01 /recvmem:srv03, dfsradmin conn new /rgname:software /sendmem:srv03 /recvmem:srv01, dfsradmin membership set /rgname:software /rfname:rf01 /memname:srv01 /localpath:c:\rf01 /isprimary:true, dfsradmin membership set /rgname:software /rfname:rf01 /memname:srv02 /localpath:c:\rf01, dfsradmin membership set /rgname:software /rfname:rf01 /memname:srv03 /localpath:c:\rf01. Lets start with the simple case of creating a replication topology with two servers that will be used to synchronize a single folder. 2. It led to a charter for our Windows PowerShell design process: 1. No. DFS Replication won't replicate files or folders that are encrypted using the Encrypting File System (EFS). You know how it is. Lets scale this up - maybe I want to create a 100 server, read-only, hub-and-spoke configuration for distributing software. Disable DFSR Sysvol replication on problematic ADC; Then you should initiate DFSR Sysvol non-authoritative restore on that ADC; Steps to perform a non-authoritative restore of DFSR SYSVOL (like "D2" for FRS) Step 1. Source: DFSR Don't configure file system policies on replicated folders. DFS Replication instead moves the older folder(s) to the local Conflict and Deleted folder. After this errors there's only informational events telling everything is running smoothly. Learn more from " Setting Up DFS-based File Replcation ." Its as simple as this: Done! In the console tree, under the Replication node, right-click the. The following table shows which editions of the Windows operating system support cross-file RDC. In the ADSIEDIT.MSC tool, modify the following distinguished name (DN) value and attribute on each of the domain controllers (DCs) that you want to make non-authoritative: Force Active Directory replication throughout the domain. Log Name: DFS Replication Yes. By default, a maximum of 16 (four in Windows Server2003R2) concurrent downloads are shared among all connections and replication groups. The same command line switch can be executed against the DFS Replication service on the hub server (" dfsrdiag.exe ReplicationState /member:CONTOSO-HUB ") in order to monitor the state of the hub server. Don't use DFS Replication with Offline Files in a multi-user environment because DFS Replication doesn't provide any distributed locking mechanism or file checkout capability. In addition, DFS Replication has its own filter mechanism for files and folders that you can use to exclude certain files and file types from replication. There is no reboot required after installing the feature. For example, if a user copies a 10megabyte (MB) file onto serverA (which is then at the hard limit) and another user copies a 5MB file onto serverB, when the next replication occurs, both servers will exceed the quota by 5 megabytes. Instead of making bulk operations easier, the DFSRADMIN command-line has given me nearly as many steps as the GUI! In addition, DFS Replication can be used to replicate standalone DFS namespaces, which was not possible with FRS. RDC divides a file into blocks. Yes. entry to increase the tested number of replicated files on a volume. Offline Files caches the files locally for offline use and DFS Replication replicates the data between each branch office. 6 Use the Get-AdObject Active Directory cmdlet against the DFSR objects in AD to retrieve this information (with considerably more details). As such, DFS Replication can replicate folders on volumes that use Data Deduplication in Windows Server 2012, or Single Instance Storage (SIS), however, data deduplication information is maintained separately by each server on which the role service is enabled. With those two simple lines, I just told DFSR to: 1. If this were DFSRADMIN.EXE, it would take 406 commands to generate the same configuration. Added How can I improve replication performance? Files with the IO_REPARSE_TAG_DEDUP, IO_REPARSE_TAG_SIS, or IO_REPARSE_TAG_HSM reparse tags are replicated as normal files. We do not support creating a one-way replication connection with DFS Replication in Windows Server2008 or Windows Server2003R2. DFS Configuration Checking The Backlog Check the DFS Replication status Using Powershell How to delete the particular Replication Group Replicated Folder list from a particular Replication Group Force Replication Last update DC name Test the Namespace servers. DFS Replication is supported on Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) volumes and previous snapshots can be restored successfully with the Previous Versions Client. For example, with RDC, a small change to a 2MB PowerPoint presentation can result in only 60kilobytes (KB) being sent across the networka 97percent savings in bytes transferred. I can create a simple one-server-per-line text file named spokes.txt containing all my spoke servers perhaps exported from AD with Get-AdComputer then create my topology with DFSR Windows PowerShell . Then, force Active Directory replication throughout the domain. While were on the subject of ongoing replication: Tell me the first 100 backlogged files and the count, for all RFs on this server, with crazy levels of detail: Tell me the files currently replicating or immediately queued on this server, sorted with on-the-wire files first: Compare a folder on two servers and tell me if all their immediate file and folder contents are identical and they are synchronized: Tell me all the deleted or conflicted files on this server for this RF: Wait, I meant for all RFs on that computer: Tell me every replicated folder for every server in every replication group in the whole domain with all their details, and I dont want to type more than one command or parameter or use any pipelines or input files or anything! Still not convinced, eh? Configure the share permissions on the destination servers so that end users do not have Write permissions. CN=SYSVOL Subscription,CN=Domain System Volume,CN=DFSR-LocalSettings,CN=,OU=Domain Controllers,DC= msDFSR-Enabled=FALSE. previously if it's a disaster recovery scenario on all DCs in the domain. There is no longer a limit to the number of replication groups, replicated folders, connections, or replication group members. Windows Server 2012 R2 introduced these capabilities for the first time as in-box options via Windows PowerShell. We even added multiple aliases with shortened parameters and even duplicates of DFSRADMIN parameters. Not impressed? The tool used for migration is a command-line utility called DFSRMig.exe and can be found on a Server 2008's Windows\System32 folder. For example, you can set the schedule to 15-minute intervals, seven days a week. If an application opens a file and creates a file lock on it (preventing it from being used by other applications while it is open), DFS Replication will not replicate the file until it is closed. I tried dfsrdiag syncnow /partner:BCN /RGName:"Domain System Volume" /Time:1 it came up successful but when I take a log of dcdiag it still has the error of The DFS Replication service failed to communicate with partner The strange part it stamps as yesterday date at 5:20pm it never shows today date and time Then set all the replication group schedules to full bandwidth, open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Only the part of the file associated with the Access Control List (ACL) is replicated, although DFS Replication must still read the entire file into the staging area. If I change GroupName to use *, and I had a reference computer that lived everywhere (probably a hub), I can easily create propagation tests for the entire environment. Steps to create a propagation report for DFS Replication: 1. This can cause DFS Replication to continually retry replicating the files, causing holes in the version vector and possible performance problems. Or you can select No topology and manually configure connections after the replication group has been created. No. If a user encrypts a file that was previously replicated, DFS Replication deletes the file from all other members of the replication group. In the old DFSR tools, you would have two options here: 1. DFS Replication doesn't support replicating files on Cluster Shared Volumes. For information about pre-seeding and cloning the DFSR database, see DFS Replication Initial Sync in Windows Server 2012 R2: Attack of the Clones. The primary member designation is stored in Active Directory Domain Services, and the designation is cleared after the primary member is ready to replicate, but before all members of the replication group replicate. Out of the gate, DFSR Windows PowerShell saves you a significant amount of code generation and navigation. RDC can use an older version of a file with the same name in the replicated folder or in the DfsrPrivate\ConflictandDeleted folder (located under the local path of the replicated folder). The disk, memory, and CPU resources used by DFS Replication depend on a number of factors, including the number and size of the files, rate of change, number of replication group members, and number of replicated folders. DFS Replication and DFS Namespaces can be used separately or together. This posting is provided AS IS with no warranties or guarantees , and confers no rights. Administrators instead had to make direct WMI calls via WMIC or Get-WmiObject/Invoke-WmiMethod . You'll see Event ID 4614 and 4604 in the DFSR event log indicating sysvol replication has been initialized. All parameters are filled in contextually, from target properties. replication group that you want to create a diagnostic report for, and then. DFS Replication uses RDC, which computes the blocks in the file that have changed and sends only those blocks over the network. Distributed File System Replication (DFS-R or DFSR) is a native replication service in Windows that organizations can use to replicate folders across file servers in distributed locations. You can also use the SMB/CIFS client functionality included in many UNIX clients to directly access the Windows file shares, although this functionality is often limited or requires modifications to the Windows environment (such as disabling SMB Signing by using Group Policy). When a conflict occurs, DFS Replication logs an informational event to the DFS Replication event log. DFS Management is included with Windows Server2012R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server2008R2, Windows Server2008, and Windows Server2003R2. DC2 on SiteB is missing several Group Policy folders under SYSVOL when compared to DC1. To get the most verbose information change the log severity level: > wmic /namespace:\\root\microsoftdfs path dfsrmachineconfig set debuglogseverity=5 DFSR uses GUIDs to identify the replicated files, which look like: AC759213-00AF-4578-9C6E-EA0764FDC9AC. dfsrdiag syncnow /partner:RedMon-FS01 /RGName:"RedMon-FS01 - RedMon-FS02" /Time:1 DFSRDIAG POLLAD /MEM:%computername% Last update DC name WMIC /namespace:\\root\mic rosoftdfs path DfsrReplicationGroupConfig get LastChangeSource Test the Namespace servers DFSDiag /TestDFSConfig /DFSRoot:\\Contoso\Apac$ Checking domain controller configuration DFS Replication is much faster than FRS, particularly when small changes are made to large files and RDC is enabled. The DFSRADMIN tool requires remembering to create connections in both directions; if I dont, I have created an unsupported and disconnected topology that may eventually cause data loss problems. The DFSR Windows PowerShell module in Windows Server2012R2 contains cmdlets for starting propagation tests and writing propagation and health reports. Yes. Look for the highlighted superscript notes for those that dont have direct line-up. There is no way to configure a quiet time for files. So you will most likely need to install recent RSAT tools for Windows 7 or Windows 8 on your desktop. Keywords: Classic This article is designed with a 2-DC environment in mind, for simplicity of description. I should configure a larger staging quota in my software distribution environment, as these ISO and EXE files are huge and causing performance bottlenecks. If you've already registered, sign in. This is the command line tool for DFSR - useful commands are: dfsrdiag ReplicationState /all - verbose output. Yes. The following list provides a set of scalability guidelines that have been tested by Microsoft on Windows Server 2012, Windows Server2008R2, and Windows Server2008: Size of all replicated files on a server: 10 terabytes. entry to clarify how DFS Replication handles hard links. 1: Initialized 2: Initial Sync 3: Auto Recovery 4: Normal 5: In Error You can also check the backlog using this command: dfsrdiag backlog /rgname:REPGroup1 /rfname:REPFolder1 /smem:SendingServer01 /rmem:ReceivingServer01 You can run this command any time to force an update in the DFS replication event log to see if the status has changed: Cross-file RDC allows DFS Replication to use RDC even when a file with the same name does not exist at the client end. If you choose to disable RDC on a connection, test the replication efficiency before and after the change to verify that you have improved replication performance. DFS Replication can't be used to replicate mailboxes hosted on Microsoft Exchange Server. Ok, weve talked topology creation now lets see the ongoing management story. Yes. Added How can I upgrade or replace a DFS Replication member. If small changes are made to existing files, DFS Replication with Remote Differential Compression (RDC) will provide a much higher performance than copying the file directly. On Site A's DC1 DFS Replication Log there's no recent errors indicating replication trouble with DC2. What would DFSR Windows PowerShell do? 7 The legacy DFSR administration tools do not have the capability to list or restore preserved files from the ConflictAndDeleted folder and the PreExisting folder. Number of replicated files on a volume: 11 million. Force sysvol replication. However, this is only a schedule override, and it does not force replication of unchanged or identical files. How to force an authoritative and non-authoritative synchronization for DFSR-replicated SYSVOL (like "D4/D2" for FRS), https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2218556, Please remember to mark the replies as answers if they help and unmark them if they provide no help. No. Microsoft does not support creating NTFS hard links to or from files in a replicated folder doing so can cause replication issues with the affected files. You can force replication immediately by using DFS Management, as described in Edit Replication Schedules. Yes. On the Problematic ADC, open ADSIEDIT.MSC tool and go to following distinguished name (DN) value and edit below attribute: The replication group schedule may be set to Universal Time Coordinate (UTC) while the connection schedule is set to the local time of the receiving member. Changing ACLs on a large number of files can have an impact on replication performance. Essentially, the server becomes a rogue primary server, which can cause conflicts. Manually triggering a DFS sync (dfsrdiag syncnow) returns an error message of " [ERROR] Cannot find inbound DfsrConnectionInfo object to the given partner." I suspect that because I manually rebuilt the SYSVOL folder on DC1, and because Samba 4's implementation of Active Directory is wonky, the proper partitions were not created. Hope this can be helpful. Servers running Windows Server2003R2 don't support using DFS Replication to replicate the SYSVOL folder. When a quota threshold is reached, it cleans out some of those files. For information about Backup and Recovery functionality in Windows Server2008R2 and Windows Server2008, see Backup and Recovery. Ensure that each of the replicated folders has a unique root path and that they do not overlap. The client compares the server signatures to its own. However, RDC works more efficiently on certain file types such as Word docs, PST files, and VHD images. I went ahead and did a non-authoritative once more on DC02, and ran a DFSRDIAG SYNCNOW. For a list of editions that support cross-file RDC, see Which editions of the Windows operating system support cross-file RDC? To force an actual replication, use the same command with the SYNCNOW parameter, plus the server to replicate with, the replication group name and a time for which to ignore the schedule (If you've defined a value for it). To remove DFSR memberships in a supported and recommended fashion, see note 2 above. Files may be replicated out of order. For more information, see SetFileAttributes Function in the MSDN library (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=182269). If two users modify the same file at the same time on different servers, DFS Replication moves the older file to the DfsrPrivate\ConflictandDeleted folder (located under the local path of the replicated folder) during the next replication. New-DfsReplicationGroup -GroupName "RG01" | New-DfsReplicatedFolder -FolderName "RF01" | Add-DfsrMember -ComputerName SRV01,SRV02,SRV03, Add-DfsrConnection -GroupName "rg01" -SourceComputerName srv01 -DestinationComputerName srv02, Set-DfsrMembership -GroupName "rg01" -FolderName "rf01" -ComputerName srv01 -ContentPath c:\rf01 PrimaryMember $true, Get-DfsrConnection -GroupName * | Set-DfsrConnectionSchedule -ScheduleType UseGroupSchedule, Get-DfsrMember -GroupName * | Update-DfsrConfigurationFromAD, Get-DfsrMember -GroupName "rg01 " | Set-DfsrMembership -FolderName "rf01" -StagingPathQuotaInMB (1024 * 32) -force, Get-DfsrMember -GroupName * | Set-DfsrServiceConfiguration -DebugLogSeverity 5 -MaximumDebugLogFiles 1250, Restore-DfsrPreservedFiles -Path "C:\RF01\DfsrPrivate\PreExistingManifest.xml" -RestoreToOrigin, Start-DfsrPropagationTest -GroupName "rg01 " -FolderName * -ReferenceComputerName srv01, Write-DfsrPropagationReport -GroupName "rg01 "-FolderName * -ReferenceComputerName srv01 -verbose, Get-DfsrBacklog -GroupName rg01 -FolderName * -SourceComputerName srv02 -DestinationComputerName srv01 -verbose, Get-DfsrBacklog -GroupName rg01 -FolderName * -SourceComputerName srv02 -DestinationComputerName srv01 -verbose | ft FullPathName, (Get-DfsrBacklog -GroupName "RG01" -FolderName "RF01" -SourceComputerName SRV02 -DestinationComputerName SRV01 -Verbose 4>&1).Message.Split(':')[2], Get-DfsrState -ComputerName srv01 | Sort UpdateState -descending | ft path,inbound,UpdateState,SourceComputerName -auto -wrap, Get-DfsrPreservedFiles -Path C:\rf01\DfsrPrivate\ConflictAndDeletedManifest.xml | ft preservedreason,path,PreservedName -auto, Get-DfsrMembership -GroupName * -ComputerName srv01 | sort path | % { Get-DfsrPreservedFiles -Path ($_.contentpath + "\dfsrprivate\conflictanddeletedmanifest.xml") } | ft path,PreservedReason, DFS Replication in Windows Server 2012 R2: If You Only Knew the Power of the Dark Shell, major new features in Windows Server 2012 R2, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJZc2idVEu4:0:0, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJZc2idVEu4), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1SuGREIOTE:0:0, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1SuGREIOTE), DFSR best practices info from Warren Williams.