SharePoint "user does not exist or is not unique" error, on site restore

Question

We backed up a site on our development server and restored it to our production server on a different domain.
To clear up all the users on the site we used the web.SiteUsers.Remove() for all users on the root web, on our dev site.
On taking a backup and restoring to the production server using stsadm, we are now getting the error "user does not exist or is not unique" during the restore process which is failing (at the stsadm -o restore command itself).
Any pointers to a solution to this or what are we doing wrong would be welcome. We are looking to remove users from the site collection before restoring to production.

Kind regards,

Answer 1

Perhaps you can use stsadm -o migrateuser (http://www.toddklindt.com/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=75) or stsadm -o deleteuser before you restore? You may want to look at this reference.

Answer 2

We had a just about the opposite of your problem when installing reporting services. Under the WSS_Content DB, some tables (.AllLists, .Webs that I can recall) had entries referencing a user in our .UserInfo table that didn't exit in our domain. Turns out it was user in a development domain. Our SQL folks had to run through the DB to set these entries to an ID (WARNING! NOT SUPPORTED! SEE UPDATE BELOW!) of a user who does exist in the domain. I'd bet your site backup has similar references that MOSS is trying to enumerate on import. Here's the link that set us on the right path:

http://objectmix.com/sharepoint/298701-stsadm-export-user-cannot-found-zone-authentication.html

UPDATE (17APR09): Someone's already sorted the author checking/reseting bit without having to resort to editing the DB manually:

http://blog.krichie.com/2008/09/12/resetting-the-author-on-a-sharepoint-site-or-wherefore-art-thou-author-redux/

Answer 3

If you are just referring to AD users then this tool called Sharepoint AD Information Sync may help you. Just like its names says its sync function is special.

Otherwise I'd rather keep my mouth shut since I have no experience on backup things.