Posted: 21 Mar 2005

Here's a typical question from a reader, who wants to automate DSRepair to run it frequently:

"I have a mix of NetWare 5.1, 6.0 and 6.5 servers. I want to run DSRepair on all of them, every other week. Is there a way to automatically do this? Or do I have to log on to each server, one at a time? That would take all day!"

And here's some insight on the topic from one of our Forum experts:

Unless there is a specific reason (such as to purge old network address attributes), this is very strongly NOT recommended. DSREPAIR is not a maintenance utility, it is a database repair utility. It sees inconsistencies in the database and attempts to fix them as best it can.

The best approach is to diagnose first, then fix the problem. You wouldn't fix your car by randomly hitting it with a mallet in the hopes that something will fall into place and fix something you were not aware of.

That said, if you really want to run a repair automatically, the eDirectory Management Toolbox is designed with scriptability in mind. It has the database repair functionality in it and can be scripted.

In my opinion, DSREPAIR is the single most improperly used tool in this respect. It's a sledgehammer intended to fix database structure problems, first and foremost. I would strongly urge you to use the iMonitor health check functionality on a weekly basis - it's a much faster way to perform a health check. For example:

1. Log in to iMonitor on a server with a copy of [Root].
2. Select "Agent Health" and look for green lights.
3. Select "Known Servers".
4. To the right of each server, select "Agent Health" and check for green lights.
5. Click the browser "Back" button.
6. Repeat this process until you've hit all the servers.

I demonstrate this regularly with a 15-server environment, and the complete health check takes only about 2 minutes.