How to Move Local Users to Network Domain Users

Before you follow these instructions...... I'm a rank amateur so I'd check to see if the smart kids have corrected my errors or improved on the method in the replies below 😀

The reason for the post is I have good and established local user accounts on all the computers and moving them to domain controlled accounts is the one topic I could not find a script to follow that worked for my low level of knowledge of OS X.

Let me first explain my setup and needs. I'm replacing a Windows Home Server (WHS) with the Mac Mini Server. My goal was to have the Mac Mini as the server holding all our photos, data, etc. and running a user account to run the family iTunes account to feed the Apple TV and be the backup / sync point for a family sized set of iPod Touches, iPads and iPhones. I want to be able to log into each mac and have the same information setting, links, etc........ basically walk around the house, find any mac shaped device not used by someone else, log in and carry on where I was before - with the MacBook Air having a portable account so it can come travelling with us.

The key hardware is...

• Mac Mini Server running Snow Leopard 10.6.8
• Apple TV
• 2 x iMac Running Lion 10.7.1 [upgraded from 10.6.8]
• MacBook Air running Lion 10.7.1 [upgraded from 10.6.8]
• Normal stuff like wifi, hubs and a router doing the DHCP (and for me reserving IP addresses based on the 'MAC Address' to save me having to manually configure all the IP addresses)

Key Resources I used as I learnt how to do this; to level set you all, I'm a relative newcomer to OS X having had a Windows life with Linux for fun, so i'm not a mac or IT specialist but like to play around.

• Apple's podcast series 'Apple Quick Tour of Leopard Server' - this is great, it informed me and kept me motivated through all the bah moments, all 33 episodes and it's in the iTunes store as a podcast.
• The book 'Mac OS X Snow Leopard Server For Dummies' - I bought this about half way through the whole process and wish i'd bought it earlier, my reccomendation would be get the Kindle version so you can search it for advice.
• The excellent information on DNS from Hoffman Labs http://labs.hoffmanlabs.com/node/1436
• The video 'Setting up a primary DNS zone.....' from Lynda.com on youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOEgQY9oFK4
• The Series of PDF document on Snow Leopard Server from Apple http://support.apple.com/manuals#mac%20os%20x%20server%20v10.6

And finally this excellent post from Joe Ferrante which was the core of what I used http://joeferrante.net/how-to-migrate-local-user-account-to-network-user-account -with-networked-home-folder-on-snow-leopard-server/

Right off we go....

Setting up the Server [this took me 6 goes to get it right as I learnt a little each time].

1. So i'm not going to go through this step by step because it in the 'dummies' book and the videos from Apple above and those will be better than anything I write but here's my details/advice.
2. I split the primary disc into 2 partitions using disk utility so I could reformat the operating system without moving my data.
   • 100GB for the OS X system
   • 400GB for user data
3. Install OS X from the DVD, press the buttons based on your desires but stop at the bit about naming you computer titled Network Names
4. READ UP ON DNS - this one of the reason I had so many goes as it was the 1st time i've set up a server like this using DNS and guessing didn't get me there.
5. If you don't have one buy a domain name for your network it make it much easier in the long run & is $10 well spent
6. The name needs to be [the computer name].[your domain name].[com or net or org, etc]
7. So if you want you computer to be called fred and you bought or have the domain location.com enter fred.location.com in the primary DNS name box
8. This shoud automatically put fred in the computer name box.
9. Follow along with the set up guide to finish
10. After you have finished the set up test the DNS with NSLOOKUP in a terminal window

    nslookup fred.location.com in my example and you should get the IP

11. Add your servers IP address to the list of DNS servers in network preferences on the client mac.
12. Bind [link] the client computers to the server in Accounts on the client computer - I used the 'dummies' book for this but there's lots of data on the web.
13. Clean up the user profile on the client to reduce the size of the Home folder as much as possible or the data transfer is loooooooonnnnng - i also connect the iMac on a cable rather than wifi to speed it up.
14. Read Joe's post http://joeferrante.net/how-to-migrate-local-user-account-to-network-user-account -with-networked-home-folder-on-snow-leopard-server/ and follow along.

    useful info I learnt somewhere - to get the paths to the folders correct in the terminal window go to the folder in Finder and then drag it to the terminal window and let go - this will put the correct link in the instruction.

15. You now need to be on a terminal window on your server, with a finder window open and logged into the client as the user you are moving
16. THE CLIENT COMPUTER NEEDS TO BE LOGGED OUT or logged in as a different user than the one you're trying to move.
17. so when you're at the right point - type sudo cp -R then hit the space bar, drag the existing user folder onto the finder window, add the /* and hit space then find the users folder on the server and drag that onto the terminal window to complete the instruction.
18. Hit enter and wait a while assuming it starts ok - i used network traffic on the Activity Monitor utility to check if it was working.
19. If you got this far and it all worked - login to the profle you moved on any computer linked to the server or the server but not the original client computer to see if it worked and all your setting and data are intact and then delete the profile off the original client if it was ok [archiving the home directory took ages for me].

As you can probably guess most of this was good learning for me and it worked successfully for me in the end, moving all my history, saved password, etc, etc without any problems.

Hope this helps other in the same situation & feel free to expand or correct this if I've missed anything.

Ed