[H-GEN] DVD Backup & burning software under Linux

[Adrian Sutton]

> If you are getting to a point where multiple servers need the same user
> information seriously consider using something like an LDAP repositroy
> with a backup server for this, at least that way you only have to worry
> about one lot of info and not /etc/[passwd-shadow] on each machine.

Actually it's basically the case of loosing your LDAP repository that I 
was thinking about.  An LDAP repository for UNIX machines is most 
likely a much simpler thing to rebuild, but an Active Directory 
repository for Windows machines is an absolute nightmare because the 
clients cache the user ids locally so you either need to restore the AD 
repository exactly (which effectively means not loosing it in the first 
place by having secondary servers etc) or perform various miracles to 
make the client machines happy again.  Of course if  you have an 
exchange server in the mix as well you're probably going to loose all 
your email.  As I said, there aren't too many things that are this 
difficult to recover from in the UNIX world (file permissions go very 
weird if you change user ids but it's pretty simple to restore the same 
userid on most UNIX systems anyway).  It is definitely something that 
needs to be considered though because it's *very* annoying to learn it 
the hard way.

Often times things like a LDAP server is like putting all your eggs in 
one basket - it makes life easier but you sure as heck better guard 
that basket well. :)

Regards,

Adrian Sutton.

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