Running 2 servers on same network

not really since a machine is joined to a domain. The user doesn't need to logout of current domain to access the other domain's data you just have to be given share permissions. i.e. you would share domainA's data using a user account xxxx@domainA

Thank you for the quick reply David.   Here are more specifics that may cause a problem with your suggested solution:   These are dental offices that use the same (but unique) practice management and dental imaging databases.    Location A points to a database on server A.    Obviously location B points to a database on server B.   During the reconstruction period, if a patient from location A comes to location B, I want the staff to be able to switch to database A.    If the patient is from location B, I want the staff to switch to database B.    If they are simply shared, the practice management software won't know where (database A or database B) to access and/or store the data.  

My hope was to have 2 different user profiles:   DomainA points to the database on ServerA and DomainB points to the database on ServerB.   Since I have never done this before I am concerned that I may be inviting conflicts that could be avoided.

If it was not setup in the begining depending on the SQL version, and whether the locations were tied in ... Using merge replication, or other mechanism that dealt with consolidating data from the various locations into the "central"

A dynamic db selection based on the customer would also require the setup to exist prior.

Your scenario would require an employee to use the correct system that has access to the db that reflects info for the pt.

Thank you Arnold for your reply.   I do not want/need to merge or consolidate the data in any way because after the renovations are complete, server A will be going back to its original location.     A & B databases need to be completely independent of each other before, during and after the renovations.

Are the application users access at each location, are these web based applications and did you create them?

If it is a web based, and can have each user to have two tabs one to each application that queries their respective db.

In the constraint you have, only way is to have a front end that interacts with each application and then depending on the application from which it gets a response that the user exists  to then proxy requests ...

Presumably if a new person comes in you may still would want to find out if this or the other location will be their primary/preferred...


Often medical softwares include handling of multiple locations which might be a path to explore for future expansion...

So you have 2 Dental clinics and one of them is going under renovation so the infrastructure from Clinic1 will be temporarily moved to Clinic2

So are you not moving the users and their workstations from clinic1 to Clinic2 ?

It all seems application and Database related handling...have you tried involving the vendor .... if you have layer 3 switch then you can just create two seperate VLAN and run two different network in same location

Thank you everyone for your input.   As it turns out the owners have opted against having the two servers in the same location and instead have chosen to use remote connections between LocationA and LocationB.   Eventually I might try temporarily relocating the other server just to test out some of these recommendations