Plan Directory Synchronization (part 1)

By Ashwin Venugopal -

 



To read part 2, please click here
To read part 3, please click here





Prepare for Directory Synchronization

First of all, you have to prepare your environment before deploying Azure AD Connect to synchronize your on-premises AD objects to Azure AD, by analyzing the following features:
  • Active Directory preparation
  • Verify UPN suffixes
  • Use Microsoft 365 IdFix tool

After successfully activating directory synchronization, you can edit synchronized objects only with the help of your on-premises AD management tools.

Active Directory Cleanup

You should focus on the following tasks:
  • Remove duplicate proxyAddresses and userPrincipalName attributes.
  • Update blank and invalid userPrincipalName attributes with the valid ones.
  • Remove invalid as well as questionable characters in the following-

  1. givenName
  2. surname (sn)
  3. sAMAccountName
  4. displayName
  5. mail
  6. proxyAddresses
  7. mailNickname
  8. userPrincipalName

Verify UPN Suffixes

It is very important to verify that on-premises user objects in AD contain an UPN configured suffix whose value is true for both the AD domain and Microsoft 365. If you use Internet routable domain as UPN, then its domain will be a UPN suffix in order to have the form user@domain for users' principal names otherwise, the default routing domain (like adatum.onmicrosoft.com) is used for the UPN suffix in Microsoft 365.

It is recommended to use the primary SMTP email address of each user as their UPN, so that various applications like Skype for Business, ask in their logon window for the email address as they technically require the UPN login name to remove confusion. 

If you want to resolve the issue of an already deployed directory synchronization where the user's UPN for Microsoft 365 is not matching with the user's on-premises AD due to the assigning of Microsoft 365 subscription license to a user before any verification of domain, then, you can use Microsoft PowerShell to update user's UPNs in Microsoft 365 to ensure that their Microsoft 365 UPN matches their corporate user name and domain in your on-premises AD. 

Use Microsoft 365 IdFix Tool

Microsoft 365 IdFix tool can easily identify and remediate the majority of object synchronization errors in your AD forests while preparing for deployment to Microsoft 365. Hence, the Microsoft 365 IdFix tool can offer the following:
  • Confirmation that each change is enforced- Only the objects you have selected to update will be changed.
  • Transaction rollback- You can undo confirmed updates to object attributes applied to the forest.
  • Well known exclusions- All the AD objects should not be made available for editing as some can cause harm to the source environment like critical system objects. 
  • Save to file- Data is exported into CSV or LDF format for offline editing or investigation.
  • Import of CSV- Data is always imported from a CSV file because this function is based on the distinguished-Name attribute to determine the value to update and it's recommended method is to export from a query like the Save to File.
  • Verbose logging- As Microsoft 365 IdFix tool makes changes to your environment, verbose logging is enabled by default. 
  • Support for multi-tenant and dedicated Microsoft 365 tenants- According to your environment, the Microsoft 365 IdFix tool supports validation of multiple or dedicated Microsoft 365 tenants. 

Warning- As this tool can change bulk-update objects, it can be potentially dangerous and you must be careful while using it. 










To read part 2, please click here
To read part 3, please click here



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