Recovery Manager for AD 10.3 - User Guide

Step 3: Create or modify backup creation schedule

If necessary, create or modify backup creation schedule for the Computer Collection to which you have just added the AD LDS (ADAM) instances. For more information, see Scheduling backup creation subsection in Task scheduler overview.

Backing up cross-domain group membership

When backing up Active Directory® on a Global Catalog server, Recovery Manager for Active Directory (RMAD) enables the backup to include the object’s membership in all groups, including those groups that reside in domains outside the object’s home domain.

This option is part of the backup creation settings. You can find it on the Advanced tab in the Properties dialog box for a Computer Collection. The option only takes effect when backing up Global Catalog servers.

If this option is not selected, group membership spanning multiple domains is not fully backed up, because even Global Catalog servers do not store full information about group memberships. For example, information about membership in domain local groups is only stored in the home domains of those groups.

To ensure that cross-domain group membership information is backed up

1. Do one of the following:

   • When creating backups for a Computer Collection, right-click the Computer Collection, and then click Properties.

   • When creating backups using the Backup Wizard, click the Advanced button on the Completing the Backup Wizard page of the wizard.

2. In the Properties dialog box, click the Advanced tab.

3. On the Advanced tab, make sure the When backing up Global Catalog servers, collect group membership information from all domains within the Active Directory forest check box is selected.

Using a Global Catalog backup created with this option ensures the complete restoration of object group memberships in all domains within the forest.

However, this option causes RMAD to retrieve data from all domains within the forest, and therefore may slow down the backup creation in case of a big number of domains or slow network connections.

Backing up distributed file system (DFS) data

When backing up a domain controller, RMAD can also back up the domain-based Distributed File System (DFS) namespace data located on the domain controller. DFS namespace data is backed up as part of SYSVOL. You can use the created backup to recover the domain-based DFS namespace.

Note that RMAD cannot back up the DFS namespace links to the actual folders and files, as well as these folders and files. Also RMAD does not support standalone DFS namespace data.

Backup scheduling

In RMAD, a backup for a computer or a collection of computers can be created manually, or the creation of backups can be scheduled to occur at a specific time in the future. Backups can be stored in any appropriate location on your network.