Brian Alderman

The Central Administration content database that is created during the installation of your SharePoint farm is probably the second most important database, with the SharePoint Configuration database being the first most important, so it is imperative that you are able to easily reference this database when performing administrative tasks.  If you perform the SharePoint installation using the GUI the Central Admin database is created with a not-so-user-friendly name that includes a Globally Unique Identifier (GUID). This name makes it challenging to work with when writing scripts that reference the database because of the GUID included in the name of this database.  You can avoid the GUID from being applied to the database name altogether if you perform a command-line installation of SharePoint because you are able to specify the name of the Central Administration content database using a parameter during the command line installation.

If you are managing a SharePoint farm that has a GUID-challenged Central Admin database name, you can use the following steps to rename the database to a more user-friendly name.

Caution: these steps should be followed very carefully to avoid any major problems with your SharePoint Central Admin Web application. With that said, it is important that you perform a backup on the Central Administration database prior to renaming it.

  1. Log on to the server that is hosting SQL Server that is hosting your SharePoint content, using an account that has full access to SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
  2. Log into SQL Server Management Studio and locate the SQL Server instance that is hosting your SharePoint Central Administration database and perform the following steps:
    1. Expand the Databases node by clicking the plus (+) sign to the left of it.
    2. Locate the Central Admin database having a name something similar to SharePoint_AdminContent_<GUID>
    3. Back up the current Central Admin content database by right-clicking the database name and then rolling over Tasks and then click Back Up to open the Back Up Database dialog box.
    4. Leave all of the settings on the backup screen at their default values and then click OK to begin the backup of the database. Notice the location for the destination of the backup created.
  3. After the backup completes successfully, you’ll need to restore the database from the backup you just performed using the following steps:
    1. Right-click the Databases node and then click Restore to open the Restore Database dialog box.
    2. In the Source section, use the dropdown arrow to locate the original Central Admin database.
    3. In the Destination section, type the new user-friendly database name such as MTP_CentralAdmin_DB in the Database box.
    4. Click the Files option in the left pane and then click the ellipsis (…) and specify the location for the .mdf and the .ldf of the new database.
    5. Begin the restore operation by clicking OK at the bottom of the dialog box.
  4. While still in SQL Server Management Studio, capture the name of the current Central Admin database
    1. Right-click the original Central Admin database and click Rename to enter edit mode.
    2. Highlight the current database name and then press Ctrl+C to copy the current name of the database, as you will use this name later.
    3. Click anywhere outside of the database name edit box to exit the database edit mode.  Note: Be careful not to accidently modify the current database name.
  5. Return to the SharePoint Central Administration page and click Manage Content Databases under the Application Management section.
    1. Using the Web application drop-down list, select the SharePoint Central Administration v4 Web application to display the original Central Admin database.
    2. Click the SharePoint_AdminContent_<GUID> database
    3. Use the Database status drop-down option to change the status from Ready to Offline
    4. Important: Do NOT check the box to remove the content database
    5. Click OK
  6. Open the Windows command prompt and perform the following steps
    1. Type cd C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web server extensions\14\BIN\ for SharePoint 2010 or \15\BIN for SharePoint 2013 to change the directory to the SharePoint root to run the following STSADM commands
    2. Remove the original Central Administration database using the following command where the UrlOfCentralAdministration and NamedInstanceOfYourSqlServer is specific to your SharePoint installation.)
      1. stsadm -o deletecontentdb -url http://UrlOfCentralAdministration:portnumber -databaseserver NamedInstanceOfYourSqlServer -databasename SharePoint_AdminContent_<GUID>  (this is where you paste the original database name that contains the GUID)
    3. Associate the newly created database (the one created in step 3) with your Central Administration using the following STSADM command (again be sure to specify the UrlOfCentralAdministration and NamedInstanceOfYourSqlServer specific to your SharePoint installation.)
      1. stsadm -o addcontentdb -url http:// UrlOfYourCentralAdministration:portnumber -databasename MTP_CentralAdmin_Content_DB -databaseserver NamedInstanceOfYourSqlServer
  7. Return to Central Administration and under Application Management click Manage Content Databases and refresh the page to verify that your Central Administration Web application is associated with the new user-friendly database that you specified in step 3.

Note: After verifying the new database name is associated with the Central Administration Web application you can delete the original Central Administration database backup that you created in step 2.