Removing roles from a Windows Server 2008 installation

Adding new roles is easy enough using the Server Manager->Add Roles wizard, however removing an installed role is not as straight forward.

In my SharePoint 2010 virtual environment I had added the role “Active Directory Domain Services” but unchecked the DNS checkbox in the setup wizard. Since I did not find a way to add DNS after the installation I decided to remove the role and add it back again with the DNS enabled instead.

So how do you remove a role?
Well, you could use a PowerShell cmdlets for Server Manager, but if you're like mw and still haven't embraced PowerShell (I will when I find time) the ServerManagerCmd.exe is the friend you need.

Here’s a great article describing how it can be used:
Using the new Windows Server 2008 ServerManagerCmd.exe CLI tool to Add & Remove sever roles

In my case it was a matter of executing the following command and rebooting the machine:

ServerManagercmd.exe -remove AD-Domain-Service