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  5. File Server File Share Migrations

File Server File Shares to SharePoint Migration Guide

​​Introduction

This is the complete onboarding task flow for migrating file shares from Windows File Servers to SharePoint Online document libraries. Due to versioning, storage usage in SharePoint may be increased when migrating with permissions.

If permissions are to be included in the migration, users must exist on Microsoft 365 and have Microsoft 365 licenses assigned to them.

You will need to create separate MigrationWiz projects for each file share. The reason for this is that each project will need to point at a different container and will need to potentially point to a different destination SharePoint site.

The following items will be migrated from the File Server to SharePoint: (Migration of versions is NOT supported with this migration)

  • Folder structure
  • Files
  • Permissions

First migration?

We’ve created a guide on scoping, planning, and managing the migration process for your use. If this is your first migration, we recommend reading this guide carefully.

MigrationWiz

MigrationWiz is a migration tool, not a syncing tool. If changes are made at the source after migration, they will not sync to the destination, nor will changes made at the destination sync to the source. We do not have “live” monitoring of changes (as with a sync agent) and we cannot handle scenarios such as conflict resolution without user interaction.

MigrationWiz supports the capability to share migration projects across a Workgroup. When the Project Sharing feature is turned on, all Agents besides those who are Inactive can view all migrations projects. 

We are not able to support migrations with two-factor or multifactor authentication. 

The maximum file size for migration through MigrationWiz varies by migration type and environment, but may never exceed 60GB.

File path limitation

SharePoint and OneDrive for Business have a 400 character limit that applies to file paths and file names. Character limits might not be enforced in other document storage services, like Google Drive or Dropbox. When migrating from one of those platforms to SharePoint or OneDrive for Business, you might need to shrink file paths and file names. Use the "ShrinkFoldersMaxLength=300" advanced option as described in the Advance Options portion of this migration guide. 

Prerequisites

MigrationWiz is able to migrate the following items with this scenario:

  • Documents

  • Folders

  • Permissions

Licensing

This migration requires an appropriate number of Shared Document Licenses.  These can be purchased with either a 50GB or 100GB limit.  If the amount of data migrating is more than the license allows, you can use multiple licenses on a single line item to migrate additional data.

This license does not support the use of downloaded BitTitan software such as DeploymentPro.

For more information on licensing, including coupon redemption and other licensing types, see our Licensing FAQ.

Prepare the Azure Environment

  1. Estimate Azure storage costs. This step is optional but is useful in providing the customer with upfront storage costs ahead of time.  You will need enough storage capacity to upload all of the migrating data.
  2. Buy an Azure subscription, or use the free one-month trial ( this option is only viable if you are performing a very small migration).
  3. Create an Azure storage account. We recommend that you create an Azure Storage Account in the same Microsoft data center as the Destination Microsoft 365 tenant. Unless specified, leave all settings as default.
    1. Visit ​https://portal.az​ure.com​  
    2. Click Storage accounts​
    3. Click Storage Create​
    4. Select the subscription in which you want to create the new storage account.
    5. Select your Resource group.​ Create new if one doesn't exist.
    6. Enter a name for your storage account.​
    7. Choose your datacenter Location.
    8. Choose Standard performance
    9. In the Redundancy field, select Locally Redundant Storage (LRS).
    10. Click Review
    11. Click Create
    12. Once the deployment shows as complete, click on Go to resource
    13. Select Access keys under "Security + Networking"
    14. Copy the Storage account name and the key 1.  You will use this when running UploaderWiz and within the migration project.
    15. Click on Containers under "Data Storage"
    16. Create a container for each separate file server you will be uploading and make note of the name(s)

When uploading, MigrationWiz will create three metadata files, which will be added to each container. These are used during migration by MigrationWiz, to build the folder structure in OneDrive for Business and to migrate the permissions. They should not be deleted until after the migration.

Prepare the Destination Environment

Set up the permissions which will be used for the migration

  1. Ensure you are signed in as a Global Admin.
  2. Go to MigrationWiz-SharePoint-FullControl and consent to the app access when prompted.
  3. Create new Security Group named “MigrationWiz” on the Microsoft 365 Admin Portal.
  4. Add the service account being used for the migration project as a member of this security group

You will also want to make sure that you create the desired destination site/subsite and document library within SharePoint

If migrating to a GCC High tenant, the above steps will not work.  Instead, use the following steps.

  1. Ensure that the service account has a license in Office 365
  2. Give the account Site Collection Admin permissions on the SharePoint sites that you want to migrate to.
  3. Authorize the MigrationWiz-SharePoint-Delegated_GCCHigh app within the tenant
  4. Within the project, add OneDriveProImportEnvironment=AzureUSGovernment to the support section of the project's Advanced Options

Upload Files to Azure

Steps are performed from a file server, or a computer joined to the domain, when logged in with the domain admin account, with local admin rights to the machine. This process utilizes UploaderWiz. Our guides contain information on running, configuring, and troubleshooting UploaderWiz. 

  1. Download and extract the UploaderWiz utility from here (e.g., extract into the c:\apps\uploaderwiz directory).
  2. (Optional, but recommended) Set the file shares to read-only access and inform the users that a migration is occurring and that their file shares are now read-only. This will prevent the user from adding files to these file shares during the migration.
  3. From the command console, running as administrator, from the directory that UploaderWiz was extracted into, run the following command (replace the x's with your own information):
    UploaderWiz -accesskey "xxxxxxxx" -secretkey "xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" -container xxxxxx -type azureblobs -rootpath "xxxxxxxx".  Note: If you are performing these steps from a domain-joined computer, a network drive needs to be mapped from the domain-joined computer to the file server (e.g. x:\File Server).  If there are spaces in the path, then it needs to be enclosed within quotation marks
      • The AccessKey will be the name of the storage account
      • The SecretKey will be the access key for the storage account
      • The Container will be the name of the conainer you are uploading to
      • The RootPath will be the path to the files that you want to migrate 

MigrationWiz Steps

Create a Document Project

  1. Log in to MigrationWiz.
  2. Click the Go to My Projects button.
  3. Click the Create Project button.
  4. Select the Document project type. 
  5. Click Next Step.
  6. Enter a Project name and select a Customer.
  7. Click Next Step.
  8. Click on New to create a new endpoint or select an existing one from the dropdown list
    • Give the endpoint a name
    • For Endpoint Typeselect Azure File System
    • Enter the storage account name
    • Enter the Access Key
    • Click on Add
  9. Click Next Step.
  10. Click on New to create a new destination endpoint or select an existing one from the dropdown list
    • Give the endpoint a name
    • Select SharePoint as the endpoint type
    • Enter the URL for the SharePoint site/subsite that you are wanting to migrate to (Example: https://domain.sharepoint.com/sites/Subsitename)
    • Enter the username and password for the service account which you added to the security group when setting up the destination
    • Select either the Microsoft Provided Azure storage (recommended) or to use Custom Azure storage.  Note that this is different from the container that the files were uploaded to.  If you want to use your own storage for this step, it is recommended to create a separate Azure Storage Account (the steps for which are the same as above)
    • Click on Add
  11. Click on Save And Go To Summary
  12. In the menu on the right, click on Advanced Options
  13. Under the Support section, enter the following Advanced Options.  Note: there are not spaces on either side of the "=" character and these are case sensitive
    • ShrinkFoldersMaxLength=200 - This option shrinks file path names to prevent issues during the migration.  The option only applies if the path length would exceed the number entered.
    • RenameConflictingFiles=1 - This prevents errors due to files with duplicate names
    • InitializationTimeout=8 - This increases the maximum allowed timeout window for the enumeration phase of the migration.  This is most useful for larger migrations, but does not negatively impact smaller ones.
  14. Click on the Source/Destination tab
  15. Under the Source section, update the Container Name to reflect the container that the items were uploaded to.
  16. Click on Save and then Save Project

Add Items

  1. Select Add/Quick Add
  2. Enter Shared Documents (or the name of the desired destination document library) as the Destination library name.  Note that you do not need to put in anything for the source.

Run Verify Credentials

  1. Open the Project containing items you wish to validate​.
  2. Select the items you wish to validate.
  3. Click on the Start button in your dashboard.
  4. Select Verify Credentials from the drop-down list.

Once complete, the results of the verification will be shown in the Status section.​ 

Start migration

  1. Select the users
  2. Click the Start button from the top
  3. Select Full Migration
  4. Click Start Migration

Run Retry Errors

Look through the user list and click any red "failed migration" errors. Review the information and act accordingly.

If problems persist, contact Support.

Post-Migration Steps

  1. Remove access to the Source file shares.
  2. Provide training on SharePoint Online.
  3. Decommission the file server. Perform this step only after migrating all data from the file server, such as home directories, when you are certain that you will not be returning to the file server.
  4. Delete all the Azure blob containers that were created during the upload to Azure.
    Important: This will prevent incurring post-migration Azure costs for these containers. Be careful to only delete the containers created by UploaderWiz; these will be names that match the file shares and have a create date from the date of the upload.
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