Changing All Staff Usernames

[cdgill241183]

Hi All,

 

During the summer holidays we plan to change all of staff usernames from payroll id to firstname.surname as well and changing all users home directory names.

 

Is there a quick way to do this with a script or by using powershell and has anyone experienced doing this before?

 

Thanks in advance

 

Chris

[sted]

by changing do you mean creating new accounts or literally just altering the details on existing ones. if its new ones creating them is fairly easy powershell and a csv file can do it, ive got a spreadsheet that creates commands that do it, theres software that does it. its more of an issue matching user areas up afterwards and copying/moving data than the actual accounts tbh.

[cdgill241183]

Yeah I meant altering existing usernames, could you let me have the csv and other details you used please?

[ricki]

You will get duplicates with that format

[sted]

im not sure it would help altering usernames i never do that i always just create new ones because it seems less likely to cause issues (i dont mind changing display name etc but altering the actual username ive always just created a new account)

 

but heres a link to hoe to use powershell to create users if its any use https://social.technet.microsoft.com/wiki/contents/articles/24541.powershell-bulk-create-ad-users-from-csv-file.aspx

[RobD]

Have you tried just changing a user name? The SIDs will stay the same so permissions shouldn't be an issue but I don't think the user folders will change names.

[cdgill241183]

Ive managed to change the usernames by using a piece of software called WiseSoft Bulk AD Users, Ive used Wisesoft software before and its always worked well, only thing i need to do now is bulk rename home folders.

 

I only done this on a test OU bofore anyone says ive destroyed my users

[HPlum78]

Set-ADObject https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/activedirectory/set-adobject?view=winserver2012-ps I would tend to agree that first.last is a bad idea from an identity management point of view also should try not to reuse any identities as well..... anyhow the above may help.

[rob_coles]

Another for wisesoft bulk ad. Export users to excel update done.

[TraylerD]

Sorry to resurrect an old thread but came across this and thought would be better than starting fresh.

 

Our usernames have always been initial + first 2 characters of surname (eg. Joe Bloggs - JBL) with same used for email. The problem comes if that creates a duplicate, it moves to next available letter (eg. Julie Bloggs - JBO). This however is now making it messier as time goes as Joe Book would then become JBK or worse if the surname happened to only contain 3 letters.

 

We've contemplated usernames becoming initials followed by incremental numbers but staff would have no hope using this for emails.

 

We'd like to move emails to initial.surname@domain but as we have had staff marry this would cause issue with them as they have the same first initial and I believe the same initial for their middle names.

 

Would anyone mind sharing examples of their username/email structure or have ideas of how we could tackle this?

[jmak]

Large organisations all seem to end up with incremental numbers in email address IME. You can minimise duplicates by having longer user names (eg firstname + initial + surname@domain [email protected]). There's always a trade of between complexity and duplicates.

[LukeRowberry]

joe.bloggs@ & joe.bloggs2@ here

[leegcvcc]

Harry Kane would be KaneH@domain and Henry Kane would be KaneH2@domain

 

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