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Chad B
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Shorten the Windows Server DFS Namespace or use Domain Alias that works with DFS

Is it possible to shorten the Windows Server DFS Namespace root address or domain name using an alias? Currently, we have it set up with \\domain.com\dfs\ but our domain name is too long and we are running into character limitations for some paths in our ERP system.  I know I can just point the paths directly to one of our file server's Hostname by that defeats the purpose of having a distributed file system.  We have two Windows 2016 Files Servers and one Windows 2008 R2 Files Server in this DFS Namespace.
Windows OSActive DirectoryWindows 10AzureWindows Server 2016

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Chad B

8/22/2022 - Mon
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Robert

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kevinhsieh

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Mahesh

Try Global DNS zones

Enable Global Names Support 1st
Create new global names zone in active directory
In that create CNAME entry pointing to all domain controllers

After that try resolving DFS name space with GlobalName


Ex:
\\Corp\dfs

It should resolve to DFS name space

https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/qzaidi/2011/01/08/quickly-explained-globalnames-zone/
McKnife

I guess many companies just deploy a drive letter mapped to \\mycorp.com\dfs
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Shaun Vermaak

You can use junctions/symbolic links to shorten the paths

You might first need to enable it to work remotely. Use this to see the current config
fsutil behavior SymlinkEvaluation

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James Murphy
Chad B

ASKER
Thank you all! We decided to use an alias to the NetBIOS of one file server on the DFS. That will allow us to redirect the path if one of our file servers goes off line.