Shadow copy services - path error on windows 7 using gpfs

[Nimrod Sapir]

Orlando Richards <orlando.richards <at> ed.ac.uk> writes:

> 
> Hi there,
> 
> I've come across an obscure problem on a Windows 7 client when accessing 
> shadow copies on our samba server, which uses GPFS as the underlying 
> file system.
> 
> I'm using:
>   GPFS 3.4.0-12 (also tested with 3.4.0-7)
>   samba 3.6.4 from the sernet repos (also tested with 3.5.14)
>   RHEL 5.6 (also tested on 5.8, 6.2)
>   ctdb 1.0.114.4-1
> 
> The task I'm trying to perform is to copy a folder out of the shadow 
> copy, and place it somewhere else (say, on the desktop, which is stored 
> on local disk). However, when doing so I get an error window up which says:
> 

Sorry for replying for such an old thread, but I had the exact same problem
lately, and the solution may be interesting to other people here. After some
research I realized that gpfs tries to resolve the paths of the snapshots
without those paths being translated by the shadow_copy module first. The
solution is very simple - put the shadow_copy2 module first in the list of vfs
modules in smb.conf. replace:

vfs objects = gpfs, fileid, shadow_copy2

with:
vfs objects =  shadow_copy2, gpfs, fileid 

This seems to be working for me, although I would be happy receive feedback from
other users.

Seems that there is a usability issue here. I don't see how it can be prevented
with the existing design of the vfs module logic, but it should at least be
documented.