1. Migrating from path-based to host-named site collections
Vili Bogdan
@vilibogdan
SPS Edmonton

2. About me Consultant at Have been working with SharePoint since 2007
Hold the MCSE: SharePoint and MCSD: SharePoint Applications certifications, as well as the SharePoint 2010 certifications
Have been filling both IT Pro and Dev roles
Father of two young boys

3. Outline Problems with path-based site collections
Advantages to host-named site collections
Disadvantages to host-named site collections
Planning a migration to host-named site collections
Migration steps, Recent migration experiences and gotchas
Resources

4. Microsoft (and the tech world) over the past 2 years
It is extremely tiring to keep up with the changes

5. Problems with path-based site collections
Only way to have sites available at different host names is to create new web applications
Can quickly lead to exceeding the threshold limit of 10 app pools per IIS server
Higher resource usage (more app pools, more web apps)
More items to manage
IIS bindings
IIS logs
Web application settings

6. Advantages to host-named site collections
Less web applications to manage
Better resource utilization on the servers
“Resources are not used to support multiple application pools and web applications”
Can have a very large number of top level domain names in use
Can use a separate top-level URL for each site collection (e.g etc.)
Can assign up to five URLs to host-named sites, including vanity URLs
Changing the URL for a site collection is easy
Set-SPSiteUrl, Remove-SPSiteUrl, Get-SPSiteUrl

7. Disadvantages to host-named site collections
Site collections and managed paths created using PowerShell
Some functionality doesn’t work with host-named site collections
E.g. Calendar overlays using calendars from a different site collection
Can’t split groups of site collections into separate search content sources
Search will not work properly if you do not have a root site collection created (path-based site collection)
Need custom solution for self-service site creation with host-named site collections

8. Microsoft HNSC Recommendations
Host-named site collection architecture and deployment (SharePoint 2013)
Single web application for all site collections, including My Sites.
No mixing of host-named and path-based site collections, except for the root site collection.
Root site collection URL will be (or
Search crawl account requires access to content through the Default zone by using Integrated Windows authentication (NTLM or Kerberos)

9. Microsoft HNSC Recommendations (cont.)
Off-box SSL termination
Reverse proxy server must be capable of generating a custom HTTP header: Front-End-Https: On
March 2013 PU is needed to enable apps in environments with multiple zones

10. When path-based site collections are needed
Need to use Self-Service Site Creation feature
Off-box SSL termination is required, but reverse proxy cannot produce the necessary custom HTTP header (Front-End-Https: On)
Use different application pools for the additional security they provide
Need to use different service application proxy groups

11. Environment details
7 SharePoint servers: 3 Web fronts, 2 search, and 2 app
About 310 site collections
About 150 GB of content
Two larger site collections (one ~35 GB, the other ~22 GB)
A handful of site collections with their own managed metadata terms
20-30 content types pushed from the content type hub
Custom “provisioning engine” for creating new site collections
A handful of full-trust solutions deployed

12. Planning a migration to HNSC
Take an inventory of the site collections in your environment:
Determine which site collections use private term sets (site-collection specific managed metadata)
Identify search web parts
Document web application-level settings on your existing web apps
Browser file handling settings
Throttling limits
SharePoint Designer Settings
Authentication providers
Script most of migration steps and test in a non-production environment

13. Migration steps
Acquire SSL certificate(s) to cover the addresses you’ll be using
Cert issued by internal CA may be enough
Run scripts to identify SC with managed metadata, search web parts
Back up your environment before starting the migration
Deploy SSL certificate
Create the web app to host the host-named site collections
Back up all site collections using Backup-SPSite
Restore site collections to the HNSC web app using the Restore-SPSite cmdlet

14. Migration Steps Re-bind site collections to their old MMS term groups
Change CT Hub Url in MMS
Re-publish content types from Content Type Hub
Run a full crawl
Set up HTTP to HTTPS redirection on IIS (or load balancer)
Modify search settings (web parts, result sources, etc.) that were using path-based queries to use SSL addresses

15. Scripting Script what makes sense:
Report first on usage of features with potential problems
What can only be done by scripting (no UI equivalent)
It may be acceptable to just document the manual process and doing it manually

16. Part 1: Create the HNSC web app

17. Create HNSC web application

18. Create managed paths

19. Create root site collection

20. Pre-create the generic content databases

21. Part 2: Consolidate path-based web application

22. Back up existing path-based site collections

23. Restore site collections into HNSC

24. Part 3: Other manual work and cleanup

25. Additional work
Re-bind site collections to their old MMS term groups (scripted)
Change CT Hub Url in MMS (scripted)
Re-publish content types from Content Type Hub (scripted)
Run a full crawl
Set up HTTP to HTTPS redirection on IIS (or load balancer)
Modify search settings (web parts, result sources, etc.) that were using path-based queries to use SSL addresses

26. Alternate approach – SPSite.Rename
February 2015 PU indicates the SPSite.Rename method can be used to convert path-based to host-named site collections
Haven’t tested this approach yet
Todd Klindt (MVP) reports it works
API reference for SPSite.Rename indicates it CANNOT be used to convert path-based to host-named site collections
Same API could be used to change the URL portion after the managed path for a path-based site collection

27. Current engagement All changes are operational tasks
Smaller changes at a time
Coordinate with other departments (e.g. Communications)
Deploy, report/observe behaviour and make adjustments

28. Resources
Host-named site collection architecture and deployment (SharePoint 2013) -
What Every SharePoint Admin Needs to Know About Host Named Site Collections - sharepoint-admin-needs-to-know-about-host-named-site-collections.aspx
Moving Path Based to Host Named Site Collections - host-named-site-collections.aspx
How to Rename SharePoint 2013 Site Collections Without Prayer or Sobbing -
February 10, 2015 update for SharePoint Foundation 2013 (KB ) -
SPSite.Rename method (MSDN) - us/library/office/bb aspx

29. Questions?