topic Re: Home Directory creation for Windows Migration in ONTAP Discussions

Home Directory creation for Windows Migration

JohnOBrien — Wed, 04 Jun 2025 14:24:05 GMT

HI All,

We are about to embark on a client CIFS migration from Windows 2k3/2k8 to NetApp 9.1 P8

Due to time constraints and the clients requests not to change the current AD home directory paths, we are obligated to match the current MSCS infrastructure in OnTap.

e.g.

\\MSCS1

\accounts-dept\data

\accounts-users$\%username%

\finance-dept\data

\finance-users$\%username%

\\SVM1

\accounts-dept\data

\accounts-users$\%username%

\finance-dept\data

\finance-users$\%username%

Is is possible to implement ONTAPs home dir functionality in this case?

I require 2 home dir shares:

\\svm1\accounts-user$\%w

\\svm1\finance-user$\%w

with the following home dir search paths

/svm1/svm1_vol01/accounts-user$

/svm1/svm1_vol01/finance-user$

Commands:

vserver cifs share create -vserver SVM1 -share-name %w -path accounts-user$/%w -share-properties oplocks,browsable,changenotify,homedirectory

vserver cifs share create -vserver SVM1 -share-name %w -path finance-user$/%w -share-properties oplocks,browsable,changenotify,homedirectory - Failied due to duplicate share name

Thanking you in advance,

John

Re: Home Directory creation for Windows Migration

JGPSHNTAP — Wed, 08 Nov 2017 14:22:11 GMT

A client's home drive should be entirely irrevelant to anyone, even the user.

When you switch to cifs home-directory search paths, that's a 'dynamic' share, so it's only created when a user logs in and no one other than the user can access it.

Can you even create a share and then add %w, I don't know, but I think you are loking at this the wrong way.

Re: Home Directory creation for Windows Migration

JohnOBrien — Wed, 08 Nov 2017 15:12:47 GMT

Hi,

My query is related to having multiple home directory shares from the same SVM and how they are setup?

I have implemented in the past with consolidations, e.g.

all user home drives migrated into a new SVM and the home dir part was straight forward:

robocopy \\windows\accounts-user$\a-e* \\svm1\vol01\home1$

robocopy \\windows\finance-user$\a-e* \\svm1\vol01\home2$

existing AD home dir object (\\windows\accounts-user$\%username%) updated in AD to \\svm1\%username%

SVM1

path: %w

relative path: %w

Home dir search paths:

/vol01/home1

/vol0/home2

/vol02/home1

/vol02/home2

Accounts user a12345 logs in and gets dynamic share from the folder /vol01/home1/a12345.

What is puzzling me here is for this migration we must retain the AD object as is.

As I understand it, I can have only 1 home dir share %w, which also limits me to a single relative path?

SVM1

path: %w

relative path: accounts-user$

is there a way to implement dynamic home directories within a single SVM where the user objects are not being standardised?

Thanking you in advance,

John

Re: Home Directory creation for Windows Migration

JGPSHNTAP — Wed, 08 Nov 2017 15:26:10 GMT

You can only have one unique home directory per svm.

You would have to hardcode a second one

Why do you need two HD's.

Re: Home Directory creation for Windows Migration

JohnOBrien — Wed, 08 Nov 2017 15:34:29 GMT

Hi,

Based on the info I've entered above, is there a solution available to me?

Or will I have to disregard dynamic homedrive functionality for these migrations?

Thanking you in advance,

John

Re: Home Directory creation for Windows Migration

JGPSHNTAP — Wed, 08 Nov 2017 15:41:32 GMT

Based upon what I see, you will need to not use dynamic home drives.

Unless I have completely missed it.

Re: Home Directory creation for Windows Migration

SYNTAXERROR — Wed, 08 Nov 2017 15:52:13 GMT

Hi John

Have you tried the following:

Define the search-paths:

vserver cifs home-directory search-path add -vserver SVM -path /VOLUME1

vserver cifs home-directory search-path add -vserver SVM -path /VOLUME2

Create a cifs share like this:

vserver cifs share create -vserver SVM -share-name %w -path %w -share-properties homedirectory

This should be what you are searching for.

Kind regards

Dario