Installing my SharePoint Server 2013 Farm – Part 2/6

Installing the Farm Domain Controller (AD DS)

This tutorial is the part 2 of the series « Installing my SharePoint Server 2013 Farm ». The series is as follow :

• Creating the farm virtual machines
• Installing the Farm Domain Controller (AD DS)
• Installing and Securing SQL Server 2012
• Installing SharePoint Server 2013
• Creating the first SharePoint Site
• Installing Visual studio 2012 and Office development tools

In this tutorial we will install the Farm’s Domain Controller. In the previous post we’ve created a virtual machine that we’ve called “AD-VM-SV01”. We will use it to install the “Active Directory Domain and Services” Role.

The steps bellow will guide you to install the AD-DS role.

-        Start the virtual machine “AD-VM-SV01”

-        Open the “Server Manager” then click on “Local Server”

-        Click on the current computer Name, the “System Properties” window will display

-        Click on “Change” button

-        The “Computer Name/ Domain Changes” window appears.

-        Enter “AD-VM-SV01” in the computer name text box.

 

-        Restart the virtual machine when asked to.

Before starting the AD-DS role installation, you have to set a static IP address for the network card. Open the “Network and sharing center” , click on you current “Active Connections” and then set an IP address.  In the DNS field put 127.0.0.1

In previous versions of Windows Server we used to use the DCPROMO command in order to install a new “AD-DS and DNS”. In Windows Server 2012 this has been made easier using the “Roles and Features” setup screen.

-        Once the machine started, open the “Server Management console” and click on “Add Role and Feature” under the “Manage” button.

-        As we’ve seen in the previous tutorial, you have to select “Role based or feature based installation” and then choose the target machine which is your local server.  This server will be promoted as domain controller.

-        In the role list, check “Active Directory Domain and Service” role. A new dialog will appear to install dependent features. Click “Add Features”

-        The Active Directory Domain and Service page will appear in which you’ll get the summary of the role.

-        Click “Next” and you will get a screen to begin the “Installation Process”

-        Click “Install”

After the installation process finishes, a new link will appear “Promote this Server to a Domain Controller”. Click on the link to make the server a domain controller.

-        The “Active Directory Domain and Service configuration Wizard” appears. We have to choose a deployment configuration. Since this server is the first Domain Controller in your virtual environment, we’ll select “Add new forest”. A textbox will appear to set the root domain name. In this tutorial I’ve used “factory.local”

In the Active Directory directory service, a forest is a set of naming contexts (NCs) consisting of one schema NC, one config NC, and one or more domain NCs. Because a set of NCs can be arranged into a tree structure, a forest is also a set of one or several trees of NCs. (see msdn)

-        Click “Next” to move to the “Domain Controller options” screen.

-        You have to select the “Forest functional level” and the “Domain functional level”. In both lists we will select “Windows Server 2012”

The fact that this server is the first domain controller in a new forest explains why the “Global Catalog GC” is checked and the “Read Only Domain Controller RODC” is unchecked as well as why both of them grayed.

The global catalog is a distributed data repository that contains a searchable, partial representation of every object in every domain in a multidomain Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) forest (see technet)

-        Make sure to check the “Domain Name System DNS Server” to install the DNS Role on the same machine.

-        Type and confirm a password for the active directory restore mode.

-        Click “Next” to move to the DNS options page. A warning will appear indicating that a delegation for the DNS Server cannot be created. Don’t worry about that, this is because DNS Service is not installed yet.

-        Click “Next” to move to additional options page. In the NetBIOS textbox type “AD-VM-SV01” and click next to move to the AD DS files locations page.

-        Keep files locations as they are. You can change them if you want. Click “Next”

-        The “Prerequisites” page appears. Some warnings appear in the results view, just check at the top of the screen if a successful message appears “All prerequisites checks passed successfully, click “Install” to begin the installation.

Once installation finishes, restart the computer and logon using the account: factory\administrator

Now you have successfully installed your farm domain controller. Next step is to add the SQL and SharePoint machines to the recently installed domain controller.