Novell NetWare Server Consolidation Utility Overview

The Novell® NetWare® Server Consolidation Utility helps you consolidate data and reorganize your network by moving data from any number of NetWare volumes (or directories within volumes) to a single NetWare 5 or 6 server, a NetWare Cluster/SAN, or multiple NetWare 6 servers. This means you have fewer servers to manage.

You can copy entire volumes and specific directories between NetWare 4, NetWare 5, and NetWare 6 servers in the same eDirectoryTM tree.You can also reassign several NDPS® Printer Agents to a single NDPS Print Manager. In each case, the accompanying rights, trustees, ownership, and name space information are copied along with the files to the destination server.

The benefits the NetWare Server Consolidation Utility provides can be better understood through the following two consolidation scenarios.

In the first scenario, suppose you have five existing NetWare 5 servers and you recently purchased two multiprocessor servers and the necessary hardware to create a two-node cluster complete with a Storage Area Network (SAN). You have decided to install NetWare 6 on the two node cluster because NetWare 6 is fully multiprocessor-enabled and comes with Novell Cluster ServicesTM software and a two-node cluster license. You want to migrate the data from each of the five servers to the SAN on the two-node cluster. Rather than manually moving all the data and printer agents or backing up the data and restoring it to the SAN, you can use the NetWare Server Consolidation Utility, which automates the data migration process.

The following figure shows how this consolidation scenario might look.

Figure 1
Cluster Server Consolidation

In the second scenario, suppose you have three existing NetWare 5 servers and you recently purchased a multiprocessor server that you want to make a NetWare 6 server. You want to migrate the data from each of the three servers to the single NetWare 6 server. Rather than manually moving all the data and printer agents or backing up the data on each of the three servers and then restoring it to the NetWare 6 server, you can use the NetWare Server Consolidation Utility to automate the data migration process.

The following figure shows how this consolidation scenario might look.

Figure 2
Multiprocessor Server Consolidation

The Server Consolidation Utility has a helpful interface that guides you through each step of the consolidation process. See Installing the Server Consolidation Utility and Running the Server Consolidation Utility for instructions on how to install and use the NetWare Server Consolidation Utility.