need advice migrating from Novell to ?? to AD

[bhodgins]

Can someone help me determine the best scenario for moving off a Novell
3.12 server to Windows 2000 server? Here is my problem:
I have a client who wants to move off an antiquated Novell server and
on to a new server capable of running their Platinum database. There
are 12 workstations hooked up to this Novell server working in a
workgroup environment, using the Novel security for File and print
only. They are going to be joining their parent company's Active
Directory environment as a remote site in about 8 months from now. I
will be putting in a Proliant with Windows 2003 server installed on
itthis week, but what is the best setup that will make the later
transition to AD the easiest? It would be a lot simpler to migrate
right from Novell to AD and be done with it, but we need an interm
setup to hold them over.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,

B

 

[Cary Shultz [A.D. MVP]]

B,

If they are going to be joining the parent company's Active Directory then I
would suspect that the WIN2003 Domain Controller that you set up will simply
be an additional Domain Controller in a remote location. I would assume (
yeah! yeah! yeah! I know better than to ass/u/me ) that the IT people from
the parent company would be responsible for doing this and sending it to the
remote location ( read: where you are ). But that is taking place in about
eight months so I am not really sure where you fit in on this. And there is
a lot more involved then simply installing WIN2003 Server. You have to have
the networking hardware set up and configured ( read: Site-to-Site VPN I
would guess ).

If you take a WIN2003 Server and make it a Domain Controller then it is not
really going to have anything to do with the parent company's Active
Directory, would it? You would be setting up a completely new and separate
Forest. This is not really going to necessarily be of any benefit to anyone
at this moment ( given that I have read your post correctly ).

HTH,

Cary