Opinions on moving Domain to Cloud only

[JustGeorge]

I work for a place that has around 200 employees. We're currently running a local Win 2012R2 domain controller with a network file share directory. We're discussing an upgrade to happen in the next 12 months. Our local Exchange server was shut down and migrated to o365 a couple years ago. 

Even though they have access to OneDrive, the staff like having an on-site file share with traditional permissions. Its just something they're accustomed to. OD gets used, but not to the same degree. 

We have several networked Printers installed on the DC. 

Given this info, would it be beneficial for us to just do away with a local DC/Server hardware and move it all to the Cloud? Admittedly, I'm not crazy about the Cloud in the personal space, but I see its benefits in a business environment. 

[+mram Subscriber²]

On 22/04/2023 at 18:14, JustGeorge said:

I work for a place that has around 200 employees. We're currently running a local Win 2012R2 domain controller with a network file share directory. We're discussing an upgrade to happen in the next 12 months. Our local Exchange server was shut down and migrated to o365 a couple years ago. 

Even though they have access to OneDrive, the staff like having an on-site file share with traditional permissions. Its just something they're accustomed to. OD gets used, but not to the same degree. 

We have several networked Printers installed on the DC. 

Given this info, would it be beneficial for us to just do away with a local DC/Server hardware and move it all to the Cloud? Admittedly, I'm not crazy about the Cloud in the personal space, but I see its benefits in a business environment. 

There's nothing wrong with either option, firstly, so don't feel like this is a "sell".

Onprem solutions usually require you to be responsible for the uptime, housing, support, maintenance, etc of a server.  Cloud removes that.

Personal or business, it's really all about cost to benefit.  Just be realistic about them.  Cloud has some very good options for storage which you really pay based upon consumption and use.  But the biggest real benefit is getting out of the server management arena and getting to a fully mobile workforce, which is kind of an abstract benefit of cloud.

If the issue is just onedrive vs a file share, onedrive is really quite mature at this point; you can mix and match that with sharepoint sites for the same kind of file access and keep it synchronized locally.  I've worked with several companies that do this regularly, and I do it personally.  

[C:Amie]

Cloud Benefits

Simplicity of the offering compared to the complexity of on-prem

It's all OpEx, there is no periodic CapEx need and thus is easier for management to swallow. One might assume that if you are running 2012 R2 still, then the hardware is likely from around 2015 at the latest in which case it is at least 7.5 years old, if not older - which is a business continuity risk and one might assume that IT is deemed to be low priority in your organisation.

As you have already migrated to 365 for mail, you have done most of the account setup and gone through a lot of the pain with 365

You don't pay the power bill, potentially lowering operational costs further depending on the size of the setup

somewhat simplifies your role and responsibilities for backup and disaster recovery

Microsoft are desperately trying to deprecate on-prem. GPO paradigms like folder redirection and roaming profiles are legacy. If you aren't prepared to move to App-V, Windows Enterprise on the client then prepare for an incresingly bumpy ride until you are forced in to the cloud anyway.

If your company is looking to divest client device responsibilities and go BYOD anyway, it's a no-brainer.

 

Cloud Disadvantages

Simplicity. You might run into things that you need but cannot get from the cloud

Lock-in. Microsoft will get you in and then have you quite well held in place. You'll be susceptible to their whims on price rises and hard up-sell. You want MDM, more money. You want proper access to Asure and policy, more money. It quickly snowballs

Without an on-prem server solution, many formerly remote IT tasks become manual touch on the client. MDM isn't good for a lot of things - certainly not inside the affordability curve of many small businesses

If you need servers anyway for some other reason - print server, imaging server, backup server, LOB app server. You'll have the virtual machine horse power anyway for a couple of DC's and a mirrored file server. If you are going to be spending the cash on the server hardware anyway, it isn't a cost saving. It just becomes an other layer of abstraction and at best you get rid of a SMB file server and replace it with a cloud file server in sharepoint.

All your data is in the cloud. At the mercy of the lowest common security denominator, some Microsoft hack/exploit. If your organisation has sensitive data, you're wandering into a minefield.

If you do not want to go BYOD, if you need locked down workstations and high security. Sticking it all in the cloud and then trying to lock that down to stop people using personal devices again just adds more cost, complexity and problems.

Your IT people will need holistically reskilling or you'll need consultancy support to do it properly

Once its done, depending on how many IT people you have, they'll be at risk because management will just assume that it can all be handled via outsourcing or by someone on-site who is really just a glorified printer consumables manager

Despite what Microsoft and others would like you to implicitly believe, you should still be backing it up, you should still have a disaster recovery solution and you still need a policy based approach to IT - in fact, with cloud, I'd argue that you need a broader policy approach than when dealing just with on-prem. This requires management to be involved and to take ownership.

All your staff will instantly ask for Mac's and once that horse has bolted forget ever going back to a managed environment

[Nick H. Supervisor]

What kind of information are you hosting on the local server?

If you can "risk" that information being accessed by external entities then putting it on the Cloud comes with many benefits like automatic backups and redundancies, for quite a cheap price. That's the short argument. @C:Amiehas done a great job of providing the more detailed response.

[JustGeorge]

On 23/04/2023 at 06:03, Nick H. said:

What kind of information are you hosting on the local server?

If you can "risk" that information being accessed by external entities then putting it on the Cloud comes with many benefits like automatic backups and redundancies, for quite a cheap price. That's the short argument. @C:Amiehas done a great job of providing the more detailed response.

Mostly Office Documents. 

The majority of our employees use there own phone but use our desktops/laptops. A handful remote in thru VPN.

Thanks everyone for the advice. Sorry I took so long to respond. Been quite the week. 

[binaryzero]

Network printers and file shares on a DC? Gross... The OS is nearing EOL, so you'll want to think about upgrading that at least to continue to receive updates.

Depends on other parts of your network infrastructure - DNS, DHCP, RADIUS?, PKI?, bunch of other stuff. Not enough info...

File Shares? SharePoint works well, depending on the type of data you're storing. OneDrive can replace personal drives (file shares), can also configure syncing of known folders (profile folders).

It's not a simple yes or no answer, typically for larger businesses hybrid is the happy medium.