HP CIFS Server 3.0d Administrator's Guide version A.02.02 (Edition 5)

Conﬁguring HA HP CIFS

Overview of HA HP CIFS Server

Chapter 11240

Conﬁgure a Highly Available HP CIFS Server

Introduction

Before conﬁguring the MC/Serviceguard packages, it is important to

understand how HP CIFS Server is able to support active-active

conﬁgurations.

The HP CIFS Server permits multiple instances of its NetBIOS and

SMB master demons.

Each CIFS Server has its own smb.conf ﬁle to deﬁne its behavior. The

NetBIOS name and IP address that the client connects to is used to

decide which smb.conf ﬁle is used for the connection. This multiple CIFS

master demon conﬁguration allows HP CIFS to run multiple

MC/ServiceGuard packages simultaneously.

When a failover occurs, MC/ServiceGuard transfers the IP address from

the failing cluster node to another node. When MC/ServiceGuard moves

the package from the failing cluster node to the other node, it activates

the appropriate CIFS Server on a remaining node. With the IP address

switched, all the trafﬁc that was going to the failed node now goes to the

other active node. The key is to have a CIFS Server conﬁgured to look

and act just like the CIFS Server that was running on the original node.

Load balancing between systems while all systems are up can be

achieved by having the CIFS shares accessible only through certain

CIFS Server names (NetBIOS names). Keep this in mind when you

associate the CIFS shares and directories with logical volumes during

server conﬁguration.

Note that each cluster node needs to know all the UNIX users that

connect to the samba servers (packages). This means that the

/etc/passwd ﬁle may need to be updated. For NIS installations, you can

generate new maps using the ypmake or similar tool if there are new

passwd or group ﬁles. For LDAP installations, you may grenerate LDAP

data for new accounts using the migration tools provided by the

LDAP-UX Integration product. These tools are found in

/opt/ldapux/migrate and documented in the LDAP-UX Client Services

Administrator’s Guide available at http://docs.hp.com/hpux/internet.