Distributed File System

The Distributed File System (DFS) is primarily a method of simplifying the view that users have of the available storage on a network—but it is also, when configured appropriately, a highly fault-tolerant storage mechanism. By configuring your DFS root on a Windows Server 2008 domain controller, you can create a fault-tolerant, replicated, distributed file system that gives you great flexibility while presenting your user community with a cohesive and easy-to-navigate network file system.

When you create a fault-tolerant DFS root on a domain controller and replicate it and the links below it across multiple servers, you create a highly fault-tolerant file system that has the added benefit of distributing the load evenly across the replicated shares, giving you a substantial scalability improvement as well. See Chapter 12, “Managing File Resources,” for more on setting up your DFS and ensuring that replication works correctly.