Large number of users (was: Cannot add machine with latest C

[Daniel Fonseca]

On 28-May-99 Joachim Kupke wrote this and I have to respond:

> I am noticing that with an increasing number of accounts (about 350 by
> now) logon performance drops rapidly. Since we are planning to include an
> even greater number of users into the database (1227, in order to speak
> exactly), I seriously consider using LDAP or some other form of data
> source for Samba, just in order to improve logon velocity.
> 
> In fact, using an AMD K6 266 Mhz server running Linux 2.0.36 without even
> touching any swap memory, logon of bottom-listed persons in smbpasswd may
> take almost a minute. The environment is likely to have all possible
> 18 workstations logon simultaneously, resulting in logon completion after
> more than 10 minutes only.

A friend of mine had that very same problem and he managed to go from 50/60
seconds per login on "bottomed smbpasswd users" to 5/10 seconds using some sort
of compile directive called FCCRYPT (heard this by voice, so may be inaccurate)
- anyway, it's supposed to be in the docs as he said - just make -L FCCRYPT or
something (I'm still using one of the first samba code "Samba version
1.9.18-HEAD" which enabled NT PDC so I don't have the necessary docs to check).

As for the machine "cloning" process, I must say I never cared about the per
machine SID, and just dumped my way out of disk images and been cheerfuly using
with no harm whatsoever - and a year has gone by. The machine name can be
modified by a proper registry file (If you want to make yourself one, just go
with regedit, look for the machine name - name it something rather unique like
"ZXCVBNMZZZ" - in the keys and export the right branch; you'll have a nive
little editable .REG to customize all your setup with a click - using DHCP
obviously)

Hope to help,

Daniel Fonseca

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Date: 31-May-99
Time: 09:49:47
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