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Active Directory 2008 : Configuring Replication (part 2) - Site Links, Bridgehead Servers

9/24/2013 7:48:39 PM

5. Site Links

The KCC assumes that within a site, all domain controllers can reach each other. It builds an intrasite replication topology that is agnostic to the underlying network connectivity. Between sites, however, you can represent the network paths over which replication should occur by creating site link objects. A site link contains two or more sites. The Intersite Topology Generator (ISTG), a component of the KCC, builds connection objects between servers in each of the sites to enable intersite replication—replication between sites.

Site links are greatly misunderstood, and the important thing to remember about a site link is that it represents an available path for replication. A single site link does not control the network routes that are used. When you create a site link and add sites to it, you are telling Active Directory that it can replicate between any of the sites associated with the site link. The ISTG creates connection objects, and those objects determine the actual path of replication. Although the replication topology built by the ISTG effectively replicates Active Directory, it might not be efficient, given your network topology.

An example illustrates this concept: When you create a forest, one site link object is created—DEFAULTIPSITELINK. By default, each new site that you add is associated with the DEFAULTIPSITELINK. Consider an organization with a data center at the headquarters and three branch offices. The three branch offices are each connected to the data center with a dedicated link. You create sites for each branch office, Seattle (SEA), Amsterdam (AMS), and Beijing (PEK). The network and site topology is shown in Figure 2. The lightning bolts indicate physical connectivity between the sites.

Network topology and a single site link

Figure 2. Network topology and a single site link

Because all four sites are on the same site link, you are instructing Active Directory that all four sites can replicate with each other. That means it is possible that Seattle will replicate changes from Amsterdam, Amsterdam will replicate changes from Beijing, and Beijing will replicate changes from Headquarters, which in turn replicates changes from Seattle. In several of these replication paths, the replication traffic on the network flows from one branch through the headquarters on its way to another branch. With a single site link, you have not created a hub-and-spoke replication topology, even though your network topology is hub-and-spoke.

Therefore, it is recommended that you manually create site links that reflect your physical network topology. Continuing the preceding example, you would create three site links:

  • HQ-AMS, including the Headquarters and Amsterdam sites

  • HQ-SEA, including the Headquarters and Seattle sites

  • HQ-PEK, including the Headquarters and Beijing sites

You would then delete the DEFAULTIPSITELINK. The resulting topology is shown in Figure 3.

Network topology and a three-site link

Figure 3. Network topology and a three-site link

The four Active Directory sites shown in Figure 3 (HEADQUARTERS, SEA, PEK, and AMS) are logical objects that represent portions of the network with strong connectivity. The lightning bolts represent physical connectivity between sites. Site links—for example, HQ-AMS—are logical objects that represent a potential path for replication between sites.

After you create site links, the ISTG uses the topology to build an intersite replication topology connecting each site. Connection objects are built to configure the intersite replication paths. These connection objects are created automatically, and although you can create connection objects manually, there are few scenarios that require manually creating intersite connection objects.

Replication Transport Protocols

You’ll notice in the Active Directory Sites And Services snap-in that site links are contained within a container named IP that itself is inside the Inter-Site Transports container. Changes are replicated between domain controllers, using one of two protocols:

  • Directory Service Remote Procedure Call (DS-RPC) DS-RPC appears in the Active Directory Sites And Services snap-in as IP. IP is used for all intrasite replication and is the default, and preferred, protocol for intersite replication.

  • Inter-Site Messaging—Simple Mail Transport Protocol (ISM-SMTP) Also known simply as SMTP, this protocol is used only when network connections between sites are unreliable or are not always available.

In general, you can assume you will use IP for all intersite replication. Very few organizations use SMTP for replication because of the administrative overhead required to configure and manage a certificate authority (CA) and because SMTP replication is not supported for the domain naming context, meaning that if a site uses SMTP to replicate to the rest of the enterprise, that site must be its own domain.

Tip

EXAM TIP

Although, in the production environment, you are highly unlikely to use SMTP for replication, it is possible you will encounter SMTP replication on the exam. The most important thing to remember is that if two sites can replicate only with SMTP—if IP is not an option—then those two sites must be separate domains in the forest. SMTP cannot be used to replicate the domain naming context.

6. Bridgehead Servers

The ISTG creates a replication topology between sites on a site link. To make replication more efficient, one domain controller is selected as the bridgehead server. The bridgehead server is responsible for all replication into and out of the site for a partition. For example, if a data center site contains five DCs, one of the DCs will be the bridgehead server for the domain naming context. All changes made to the domain partition within the data center replicate to all DCs in the site. When the changes reach the bridgehead server, those changes are replicated to bridgehead servers in branch offices, which in turn replicate the changes to DCs in their sites. Similarly, any changes to the domain naming context in branch offices are replicated from the branches’ bridgehead servers to the bridgehead server in the data center, which in turn replicates the changes to other DCs in the data center. Figure 4 illustrates intrasite replication within two sites and the intersite replication using connection objects between the bridgehead servers in the sites.

To summarize, the bridgehead server is the server responsible for replicating changes to a partition from other bridgehead servers in other sites. It is also polled by bridgehead servers in other sites to determine when it has changes that they should replicate.

Sites, intrasite replication, bridgehead servers, and intersite replication

Figure 4. Sites, intrasite replication, bridgehead servers, and intersite replication

Bridgehead servers are selected automatically, and the ISTG creates the intersite replication topology to ensure that changes are replicated effectively between bridgeheads sharing a site link. Bridgeheads are selected per partition, so it is possible that one DC in a site might be the bridgehead server for the schema and another might be the bridgehead server for the configuration. However, you will usually find that one domain controller is the bridgehead server for all partitions in a site unless there are domain controllers from other domains or application directory partitions, in which case bridgeheads will be chosen for those partitions.

Preferred Bridgehead Servers

You can also designate one or more preferred bridgehead servers.

To designate a domain controller as a preferred bridgehead server:

  1. Open the properties of the server object in the Active Directory Sites And Services snap-in.

  2. Select the transport protocol, which is almost always IP, and then click Add.

You can configure more than one preferred bridgehead server for a site, but only one will be selected and used as the bridgehead. If that bridgehead fails, one of the other preferred bridgehead servers will be used.

It’s important to understand that if you have specified one or more bridgehead servers and none of the bridgeheads is available, no other server is automatically selected, and replication does not occur for the site even if there are servers that could act as bridgehead servers. In an ideal world, you should not configure preferred bridgehead servers. However, performance considerations might suggest that you assign the bridgehead server role to domain controllers with greater system resources. Firewall considerations might also require that you assign a single server to act as a bridgehead instead of allowing Active Directory to select and possibly reassign bridgehead servers over time.

Other  
  •  Active Directory 2008 : Configuring the Global Catalog and Application Directory Partitions (part 2) - Understanding Application Directory Partitions
  •  Active Directory 2008 : Configuring the Global Catalog and Application Directory Partitions (part 1) - Universal Group Membership Caching
  •  Active Directory 2008 : Configuring Sites and Subnets (part 2) - Managing Domain Controllers in Sites, Understanding Domain Controller Location
  •  Active Directory 2008 : Configuring Sites and Subnets (part 1) - Creating Sites
  •  Exchange Server 2010 : Working with Distribution Groups and Address Lists - Managing Offline Address Books
  •  Exchange Server 2010 : Working with Distribution Groups and Address Lists - Managing Online Address Lists
  •  Exchange Server 2010 : Working with Distribution Groups and Address Lists - Other Essential Tasks for Managing Groups
  •  Sharepoint 2013 : Exporting eDiscovery results
  •  Sharepoint 2013 : Creating an eDiscovery query
  •  Sharepoint 2013 : Removing an eDiscovery hold, Accessing deleted content under legal hold
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