[Samba] staled connections between Samba and password server

[Charles Bueche]

Hi all,

I'm progressing through an issue we have at a large customer site. We
have slowly eliminated the basic issues, but the main problem remain : the
Samba server stacks up staled connections/sockets up to max, until the
service breaks. A restart flush the staled connections and Samba works
again.

platform : IBM 4-cpu server runing AIX 4.3
Samba    : 2.2.7a compiled with gcc 2.95.3
clients  : about 100-200, worldwide (mix of W2K and XP)
samba config : pretty straightforward, security=server 

We have reproduced the problem with 3 separate AIX servers. The Recv-Q
showed by "netstat -an" grows for connections inactive for many hours
(long client night jobs finish during night, then inactive until user
comes back at morning).

The password server is a Windows box (W2K), role = PDC.

We initially suspected a firewall between the samba server and the
password server, which would drop inactive TCP sessions. The net guy says
there is no such FW between the boxes.

Any idea what would be the cause of these staled connections, and how to
solve it?

Thanks in advance for any hint,
Charles

-- 
Charles Bueche <charles at bueche.ch>
sand, snow, wave, wind and net -surfer