[Samba] Backup of virtualized Samba4 AD

[Ulrich Schinz]

Hi there,

current situation: we have a Samba4 AD running on a VMware ESX-Cluster 
(ha/failover, ha-nfs-stores).

I'm doing backups with ghetto VCB. Until now I only did 
"Snapshot-backups". But I know, that this way of backups is not the best 
way for domaincontrollers.

I'm now planning to do backups by shutting down the VM, then doing 
backup and then starting machine again.

Maybe someone can give me some hints, which backupsoftware to use or 
what to consider in this topic.

Some time ago I had an error, that a client couldn't connect to AD 
("Could not determin trust relation"... something like that was the 
errormessage).

I'd like to avoid inconsitencies. Example:

- SAMBA4 shut down
- SAMBA4 backup
- SAMBA4 start
- HERE SOMETHING CAN OCCUR... WELL MAYBE
- Server, which is connected to domain as a client, shut down
- Server backup
- Server start

In this scenario it could be the case, that the client is doing 
something with the domaincontroller (where i wrote HERE SOMETHING 
CAN:......).
Do you think restoring the Backup of SAMBA4 and the Server could be a 
Problem, or should this be no problem at all?

I'm aware that I have to be carefull in a multiple AD-Server situation. 
But I'm unsure if there would be inconsistency problems in a AD-Clients 
situation....

Kind regards
Uli