Changing Names in Active Directory 1

[pgaliardo]

In everyone's experience, what is the best way to handle name changes in AD? For example, a person is getting married. Is it as simple as renaming the account? What are some problems you have encountered? Also, as far as SMTP addresses, I am thinking of adding an additional SMTP address and keeping the old one active for a certain amount of time. This way, outside people e-mailing this person can still e-mail her old address until they are notified that her address has changed. Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

 

[Davetoo]

If you're just changing the display name, then yes, right click, rename, fill it out, and it makes all the changes for you from there. If you need to change the login, you have to be sure you catch any profile changes as well (i.e. mapped home folder, etc).

As for the email, what you described is what I do. Works great and if you forget to go remove the other address it's not really a big deal unless you need it in the future. Even then, you just send an email to it and see who responds.

I'm Certifiable, not cert-ified.
It just means my answers are from experience, not a book.
The poster formerly known as lander215

 

[pgaliardo]

Thanks Davetoo. I was going to just do the display name. However the user in question is actually getting divorced, not married and wants no part of her married name anymore. So I guess I am changing the login and all account settings. I think I need to change the path to her home folder and romaing profile and change the name of the folders themselves. Thanks for the advice.

 

[mwstewart]

I have also had trouble renaming account in AD; however, in my case we have redirected the users' folder with group policy. When we change an account name, the folders don't always get updated automatically. I tried updating the folders manually after making an account name change, but then the account couldn't find the folders, as if it was looking for the original name. I thought the folders would carry the same SID so that AD would reconize it no matter what the name was. Any advice? Thanks in advance.

 

[monsterjta]

mwstewart, rename the redirected folder to, say...username_bu. Log in with the user, and the folder should be re-created. Logout of the users profile. Copy the contents of the backup folder to the newly created user folder. Login with user. Should have everything there. Delete the backup folder.

Hope This Helps,

Good Luck!