How to manually decommission a root server that hosts a domain-based DFS root

Posted on 2010-12-14 in how-to, windows-server • 413 words • 2 minute read

Last updated on 2010-12-14

Tags: Administration, DFS, Windows Server

In the past I have exposed how to deal with DFS service, moving replicated folders. Today I want to expose how manually decommission a namespace root server when it is no longer available. In our case it has been due a renaming process that we’ve lost contact with the server, and consequently we have not been able to correctly disable/delete it from the DFS management console.

When the DFS namespace servers cannot be contacted your last chance is to remove manually the namespace server; replacing it or re-adding it with correct data. To accomplish this:

1. Remove the root server from the DFS namespace. To do this:

   • Use the DFS Management Console to remove the root server from the DFS namespace. To do this:

     1. Click Start, point to All Programs, point to Administrative Tools, and then click DFS Management Console.

     2. In the left pane, expand Namespaces and click the namespace that contains the server that you want to remove.

     3. In the right pane, click Namespace Servers tab to display the servers.

     4. Select the failed namespace server and click Delete on the actions pane.

        _Note: You should forcibly delete the namespace server if it is not available. DFS management console will let you do it when selecting the Delete option.
        _

     5. Click Yes.

     6. Close the DFS snap-in

        Note: At this point you can add another namespace server to substitute the one failed.

2. On the decommissioned root target, remove DFS information from the registry by using the following Dfsutil.exe command:

   • **Dfsutil /Clean /Server:**RootTargetServer **/Share:**DFS share name

3. On the decommissioned root server, restart the Distributed File System service from the Services console or using the following command:

   • net stop dfs && net start dfs

4. After restarting the service you will be able to remove the old DFS shares. To do that:

   1. Open the “Share and Storage Management” MMC snap-in. To do this, run the StorageMgmt.msc tool.

   2. Right-click the share of the namespace, and then click Stop Sharing.

      Note: If you receive the following error message, you must restart the server and then remove the share by using Computer Management MMC snap-in:

      The system cannot stop sharing <\\server\share> because the shared folder is a Distributed File System (DFS) namespace root

You can extend this information on the links below:

• About the DFS Namespaces service and its configuration data on a computer that is running Windows Server 2003 or Windows Server 2008
• How to manually decommission a root server that hosts a domain-based DFS root in Windows Server 2003