Understanding NIS data migration

Server for NIS allows Network Information Service (NIS) map data to be migrated to Active Directory. During installation, Server for NIS extends the Active Directory schema.

After the migration, and upon receiving NIS requests from clients or other servers, Server for NIS searches Active Directory to reply to NIS queries.

Migration consists of the following three steps:

Migrate the NIS maps to a Windows 2000–based server
- Using the command line
  Windows Services for UNIX includes a command-line tool called nis2ad to migrate maps from UNIX-based NIS servers to Active Directory–based Server for NIS.
- Using the Migration wizard
  Windows Services for UNIX includes a Migration wizard that extracts the information necessary to perform the migration. Even when using the Migration wizard, however, you must complete steps 2 and 3, following.
The Migration wizard and nis2ad read map data from NIS map source files, the plain text files from which the NIS map databases are compiled. These source files must be located in a location that can be accessed by the domain controller during migration, such as on a disk on the domain controller or in a shared directory accessible by the domain controller.
Inform the existing subordinate (slave) NIS servers of the new master NIS server.
After the migration, the original UNIX-based NIS server must send an update of maps to all subordinate NIS servers with the name of the new master server in the maps.
Disable the original NIS server

After pushing the maps containing the name of the new master server, the ypserv process on the UNIX NIS server must be disabled.

Subordinate NIS servers based on UNIX can continue to work as before. They will continue to receive map updates from the Windows 2000–based computer instead of the UNIX-based computer. Client computers will continue to get NIS maps or data from the new master.

This section provides information about the following: