So you will most likely need to install recent RSAT tools for Windows 7 or Windows 8 on your desktop. In addition, DFS Replication can be used to replicate standalone DFS namespaces, which was not possible with FRS. I guess I got a bit excited there. Make sure to install DFSR management tools. Doing so can cause DFS Replication to move conflicting copies of the files to the hidden DfsrPrivate\ConflictandDeleted folder. It led to a charter for our Windows PowerShell design process: 1. For example, if all logon scripts were accidentally deleted and a manual copy of them was placed back on the PDC Emulator role holder, making that server authoritative and all other servers non-authoritative would guarantee success and prevent conflicts. Morphed folders: To prevent morphed folder names, DFS Replication stores conflicting data in a hidden DfsrPrivate\ConflictandDeleted folder (located under the local path of the replicated folder). For information about pre-seeding and cloning the DFSR database, see DFS Replication Initial Sync in Windows Server 2012 R2: Attack of the Clones. Instead of making bulk operations easier, the DFSRADMIN command-line has given me nearly as many steps as the GUI! DFS Replication overcomes three common FRS issues: Journal wraps: DFS Replication recovers from journal wraps on the fly. This is different from the Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS), and DFS Replication does not saturate the connection if you set it appropriately. If changed files have not been replicated, DFS Replication will automatically replicate them when configured to do so. For more information about why .pst files cannot be safely accessed from across a network, see article 297019 in the Microsoft Knowledge Base (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=125363). To use cross-file RDC, one member of the replication connection must be running an edition of the Windows operating system that supports cross-file RDC. This "prestaging" can dramatically reduce the amount of data replicated during the initial replication. Yes. For more information, see Automating DFS Replication Health Reports (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=74010). Scripts can use WMI to collect backlog informationmanually or through MOM. DFS Replication is supported on Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) volumes and previous snapshots can be restored successfully with the Previous Versions Client. The service will retry the connection periodically. Updated the What are the supported limits of DFS Replication? DFS Replication and DFS Namespaces can be used separately or together. TechEd North America 2014 with live demos and walkthroughs: Its the age of Windows PowerShell, folks. 100 read-only servers added in a hub and spoke, using four commands, a text file, and some variables and aliases used to save my poor little nubbin fingers. To view or manage replication groups that contain read-only replicated folders or members that are failover clusters, you must use the version of DFS Management that is included with Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2008 R2, the Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 8, or the Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 7. If you need to change the path of a replicated folder, you must delete it in DFS Management and add it back as a new replicated folder. Update May 2014: See it all in video! No, you cannot configure which file attributes that DFS Replication replicates. Bandwidth throttling with DFS Replication is not completely accurate because DFS Replication throttles bandwidth by throttling RPC calls. During the recovery, this volume is not available for replication in either direction. . On Site A's DC1 DFS Replication Log there's no recent errors indicating replication trouble with DC2. DFS Replication and FRS can run on the same server at the same time, but they must never be configured to replicate the same folders or subfolders because doing so can cause data loss. Sharing best practices for building any app with .NET. If you configure bandwidth throttling when specifying the schedule, all connections for that replication group will use that setting for bandwidth throttling. 2. DFS Replication requires NTFS because it uses the NTFS change journal and other features of the NTFS file system. Each existing file or folder will be marked as journalWrap and verified against the file system before replication is enabled again. The DFSR Windows PowerShell module in Windows Server2012R2 contains cmdlets for starting propagation tests and writing propagation and health reports. Don't configure file system policies on replicated folders. 2. This event does not require user action for the following reasons: It is not visible to users (it is visible only to server administrators). Consequently, there are custom DFSR replication schedules all over the connections and RGs. No. For a list of editions that support cross-file RDC, see Which editions of the Windows operating system support cross-file RDC? Start the DFSR service on the domain controller that was set as authoritative in Step 2. For more information, see DFS Replication Initial Sync in Windows Server 2012 R2: Attack of the Clones. In the old DFSR tools, you would have two options here: 1. To overwrite the configured schedule, use the WMI method ForceReplicate(). Files may be replicated out of order. No. Description: The following are best practices for implementing file screens or quotas: The hidden DfsrPrivate folder must not be subject to quotas or file screens. Updates for the latest version of Windows Server. 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. For instance, if youre troubleshooting with Microsoft Support and they say, I want you to turn up the DFSR debug logging verbosity and number of logs on all your servers, you can now do this with a single easy command: Or what if I just set up replication and accidentally chose the empty folder as the primary copy, resulting in all my files moving into the hidden PreExisting folder, I can now easily move them back: Dang, that hauls tail! For example, the Extensible Storage Engine (ESE) technology used for the DFS Replication database can consume a large percentage of available memory, which it releases on demand. For more information, see SetFileAttributes Function in the MSDN library (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=182269). Log Name: DFS Replication You'll see Event ID 4614 and 4604 in the DFSR event log indicating sysvol replication has been initialized. Local time means the time of the member hosting the inbound connection. Or you could do the test in lab. Ok, weve talked topology creation now lets see the ongoing management story. However, when hosting multiple applications or server roles on a single server, it is important that you test this configuration before implementing it in a production environment. Files are staged on the sending member when the receiving member requests the file (unless the file is 64 KB or smaller) as shown in the following table. Click Start, point to Administrative Tools, and then click DFS Management. You want to force the non-authoritative synchronization of sysvol replication on a domain controller (DC). This occurs because Windows applies the System and Hidden attributes to the volume root folder by default. Ensure that each of the replicated folders has a unique root path and that they do not overlap. It moves the other file into the DfsrPrivate\ConflictandDeleted folder (under the local path of the replicated folder on the computer that resolved the conflict). To secure data transfers across the Internet, the DFS Replication service is designed to always use the authentication-level constant, RPC_C_AUTHN_LEVEL_PKT_PRIVACY. List DFS replication groups: dfsradmin rg list. Take this into account when the replication group spans multiple time zones. Watch here as Windows PowerShell autocompletes all my typing and guides me through the minimum required commands to setup my RG: (If you can't see the preview, go here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJZc2idVEu4). Applies to: Windows Server 2012 R2 Upgrade to Microsoft Edge to take advantage of the latest features, security updates, and technical support. Screened files must not exist in any replicated folder before screening is enabled. No. IT pros have strong feelings about Windows PowerShell, but if they can be turned, theyd be a powerful ally. If making any DC authoritative, the PDC Emulator as authoritative is preferable, since its sysvol replication contents are most up to date. If any part of the file is already being transmitted, DFS Replication continues the transmission. The amount of disk traffic is still proportional to the size of the files because the files must be read to and from the staging folder. Yes, DFS Replication can replicate folders on volumes that use Data Deduplication in Windows Server. For more information, see "DFS Replication security requirements and delegation" in the Delegate the Ability to Manage DFS Replication (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=182294). You can choose a topology when you create a replication group. Remote differential compression (RDC) is a client-server protocol that can be used to efficiently update files over a limited-bandwidth network. Do not use DFS Replication in an environment where multiple users update or modify the same files simultaneously on different servers. Added the Does DFS Replication continue staging files when replication is disabled by a schedule or bandwidth throttling quota, or when a connection is manually disabled? Added How can I improve replication performance? If setting the authoritative flag on one DC, you must non-authoritatively synchronize all other DCs in the domain. However, if the DFS Replication database on the server subsequently suffers irreversible corruption or data loss, the server attempts to perform an initial replication as the primary member instead of recovering its data from another member of the replication group. For information about Backup and Recovery functionality in Windows Server2008R2 and Windows Server2008, see Backup and Recovery. Hope this can be helpful. By default, a maximum of 16 (four in Windows Server2003R2) concurrent downloads are shared among all connections and replication groups. The sample is useable for simpler setup cases and also demonstrates (with plenty of comments!) 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. If this happens, use the Dfsradmin membership /set /isprimary:true command on the primary member server to restore the primary member designation manually. DFS Replication won't replicate files or folders that are encrypted using the Encrypting File System (EFS). There's no indication of recent dirty shutdown on DC2 event viewer logs. According to the math, I need at least 32 GB of staging space on this replicated folder. If you had more than one affected DC, expand the steps to include ALL of them as well. Edited the Does DFS Replication replicate NTFS file permissions, alternate data streams, hard links, and reparse points? Lets start with the simple case of creating a replication topology with two servers that will be used to synchronize a single folder. Windows Server 2012 R2 introduced these capabilities for the first time as in-box options via Windows PowerShell. DFS Replication relies on Active Directory Domain Services for configuration. DFS Management has an in-box diagnostic report for the replication backlog, replication efficiency, and the number of files and folders in a given replication group. The server clocks must be set within five minutes of each other (by default) for Kerberos authentication to function properly. I want them all to update right now: Oh baby! For more information about the initial replication, see Create a Replication Group. This can delay when the file is available on the receiving member. As the DFSR development team, we wanted to be part of the solution. What would DFSR Windows PowerShell do? It's possible for individual members of a replication group to stay within a quota before replication, but exceed it when files are replicated. Start the DFSR service on the other non-authoritative DCs. No. As a result, various buffers in lower levels of the network stack (including RPC) may interfere, causing bursts of network traffic. DFS Replication then uses Remote Differential Compression (RDC) to perform a synchronization that determines whether the data is the same on the sending and receiving members. We then devoted ourselves to this, sometimes arguing late into the night about a PowerShell experience that you would actually want to use. Edited the Can DFS Replication replicate Outlook .pst or Microsoft Office Access database files? Nave approaches like 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. There is no way to configure a quiet time for files. 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. Edited the What are the supported limits of DFS Replication? Cross-file RDC allows DFS Replication to use RDC even when a file with the same name does not exist at the client end. Look for the highlighted superscript notes for those that dont have direct line-up. Yes. Not impressed? No. No folders may exceed the quota before the quota is enabled. entry to add discussion of ReFS. DFS Replication uses new objects in the domain-naming context of Active Directory Domain Services to store configuration information. Since things are going so well, I think Ill kick back and read some DFSR best practices info from Warren Williams . Task Category: None No. If no changes are allowed on the branch servers, then there is nothing to replicate back, simulating a one-way connection and keeping WAN utilization low. SIS is used by Remote Installation Services (RIS), Windows Deployment Services (WDS), and Windows Storage Server. Yes. Propagation test completes in few minutes from DC2 => DC1 but not in opposite direction. There is no longer a limit to the number of replication groups, replicated folders, connections, or replication group members. You can't use the DFS Management snap-in (Dfsmgmt.msc) or the Dfsradmin.exe command-line tool to achieve this. No. Restore-DfsrPreservedFiles is so cool that it rates its own blog post (coming soon). Then you can use Get-Content or Import-CSV to import them with Set-DfsrConnectionSchedule or Get-DfsrGroupSchedule . Changed portions of files are compressed before being sent for all file types except the following (which are already compressed): .wma, .wmv, .zip, .jpg, .mpg, .mpeg, .m1v, .mp2, .mp3, .mpa, .cab, .wav, .snd, .au, .asf, .wm, .avi, .z, .gz, .tgz, and .frx. 2. For example, creating multiple folders simultaneously with identical names on different servers replicated using FRS causes FRS to rename the older folder(s). Yes. entry to correct the potential impact of using DFS Replication with .pst and Access files. Windows and DFS Replication support folder paths with up to 32thousand characters. 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. Antivirus applications can cause excessive replication if their scanning activities alter the files in a replicated folder. 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. DFS Replication can't be used to replicate mailboxes hosted on Microsoft Exchange Server. If the initial replication fails or the DFS Replication service restarts during the replication, the primary member sees the primary member designation in the local DFS Replication database and retries the initial replication. The primary member designation is used only during the initial replication process. You can use the Dfsrdiag command line tool to specify a static port instead of the ephemeral port. - Firewalls are disabled on all DCs (temporary) - Active Directory replication looks good on all 4 DCs. No. This prevents DFS Replication from replicating these files until they are closed. RDC is not used on files smaller than 64KB and might not be beneficial on high-speed LANs where network bandwidth is not contended. This is old stuff, first set up years ago when bandwidth was low and latency high. Test file stays "Arrival pending" state indefinetely. No. 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). However, the reparse tag and reparse data buffers are not replicated to other servers because the reparse point only works on the local system. all other DCs in the domain. - Promoted the new 2022 DCs with Schema, Enterprise and Domain Admin account. TELL ME!!! No. Data replicates according to the schedule you set. Although DFS Replication only supports replicating content between servers running Windows Server, UNIX clients can access file shares on the Windows servers. Yes. DFS Replication is not limited to folder paths of 260characters. After this errors there's only informational events telling everything is running smoothly. You can configure DFS Replication to use a limited amount of bandwidth on a per-connection basis (bandwidth throttling). You can also force replication by using the Sync-DfsReplicationGroup cmdlet, included in the DFSR PowerShell module introduced with Windows Server2012R2, or the Dfsrdiag SyncNow command. In case you are not sure what would happen, you could simply take a system state backup of DC1. 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. Yes. This size threshold is 64KB by default. 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. 2. When a quota threshold is reached, it cleans out some of those files. DFS Replication replicates NTFS file permissions and alternate data streams. Windows SharePoint Services can be downloaded from the Microsoft Web site; it is not included in newer versions of Windows Server. Yes. In the console tree, under the Replication node, right-click the. 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. RDC is used when the file exceeds a minimum size threshold. It also assumes you have the ability to restore data that was deleted, overwritten, damaged, and so on. Because this process relies on various buffers in lower levels of the network stack, including RPC, the replication traffic tends to travel in bursts which may at times saturate the network links. 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 does not need to know anything about the contents of the fileonly which blocks have changed. Ultrasound and Sonar are only capable of monitoring FRS. Bandwidth throttling can be also set as a connection-level setting using DFS Management. To force DFSR to replicate Sysvol it would be Text dfsrdiag pollad For regular replicated shares it would be Text dfsrdiag syncnow /partner:DFSRPARTNER /RGName:REPLICATEDFOLDER1 /Time:1 I will note that this command only does something if its not a replication time. Doing so can cause numerous problems including health-check topology errors, staging issues, and problems with the DFS Replication database. To learn about different methods of tuning replication performance, see Tuning Replication Performance in DFSR on the Ask the Directory Services Team blog. I ran a propagation report and checked the logged, and now SSDC02's status is stuck at "Arrival Pending" No. Update managers work independently of one another. When creating replication groups with a large number or size of files we recommend exporting a database clone and using pre-seeding techniques to minimize the duration of initial replication. Changing ACLs on a large number of files can have an impact on replication performance. section with results from tests on Windows Server2012R2. DFS Replication renames the file on all other members of the replication group during the next replication. 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: Lets scale this up - maybe I want to create a 100 server, read-only, hub-and-spoke configuration for distributing software. entry to clarify how DFS Replication handles hard links. "DFSRDIAG SyncNow" for "DFS-R Replication Connection" "DFSRDIAG PollAD" for "DFS Replication Service" All tasks are executed in the "DFS Replication Monitoring Account" security context and are returning verbose output of the actions performed. DFS Replication uses RDC, which computes the blocks in the file that have changed and sends only those blocks over the network. Run the following command from an elevated command prompt on the same server that you set as authoritative: You'll see Event ID 4602 in the DFSR event log indicating sysvol replication has been initialized. .pst and Access files tend to stay open for long periods of time while being accessed by a client such as Outlook or Office Access. Windows Server 2012 R2 introduced these capabilities for the first time as in-box options via Windows PowerShell. Number of replicated files on a volume: 11 million. On the same DN from Step 1, set msDFSR-Enabled=TRUE. 3. The following attribute values are replicated by DFS Replication, but they do not trigger replication. I start to poke around in DFSMGMT and see that undoing all these little nuggets is going to be a real pain in the tuchus, as there are hundreds of customizations. Yes. How to perform an authoritative synchronization of DFSR-replicated sysvol replication (like D4 for FRS) If setting the authoritative flag on one DC, you must non-authoritatively synchronize Size of all replicated files on a server: 100 terabytes. Set the DFS Replication service Startup Type to Manual, and stop the service on all domain controllers in the domain. For more information about replicating SYSVOL by using DFS Replication, see the Migrate SYSVOL replication to DFS Replication. DFS Replication does not explicitly require time synchronization between servers. Hi folks, Ned here again. For more information, see the following Microsoft Web sites: There is one update manager per replicated folder. Hard link files are ignored by DFS Replication and are not replicated. Then let the changes replicate to the destination servers. Essentially, the server becomes a rogue primary server, which can cause conflicts. For more information, see Distributed File System Replication Cmdlets in Windows PowerShell. First published on TECHNET on Aug 20, 2013. This can cause DFS Replication to continually retry replicating the files, causing holes in the version vector and possible performance problems. The Standard Editions of Windows Server do not support cross-file RDC. Yes, DFS Replication in Windows Server2012R2, Windows Server 2012 and Windows Server2008R2 includes the ability to add a failover cluster as a member of a replication group. Yes. 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 . For more information, see the Ask the Directory Services Team blog. This FAQ answers questions about Distributed File System (DFS) Replication (also known as DFS-R or DFSR) for Windows Server. A real attribute is an attribute that can be set by the Win32 function SetFileAttributes. This is because DFS Replication throttles bandwidth by throttling RPC calls. Best Regards, David Shen Meanwhile, asMVP mentioned, you couldtake a system state backup of DC1. List members of a replication group: During initial replication, the primary member's files will always take precedence in the conflict resolution that occurs if the receiving members have different versions of files on the primary member.
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