Replication Methods

Sun Directory Services replication is based on the LDAP protocol. However, when the NIS service is enabled on a Sun Directory Services server, NIS replication can take place between this server and legacy NIS servers.

The NIS replication feature of Sun Directory Services offers a smooth transition from a classic NIS naming service to an integrated naming and directory service.

LDAP replication has the following advantages over NIS replication:

• Partial replication is possible: you can choose the part of the DIT that you want to replicate, and you can also replicate just the changed attributes of modified entries

• Better scalability: NIS replication is likely to fail if the number of entries replicated is in excess of 50,000.

Therefore, when the Sun Directory Services product is installed on several servers used as NIS servers, NIS replication should be disabled in favor of LDAP replication. For details, refer to "Configuring the NIS Service".

There are two replication modes for propagating changes between master servers and slave servers:

• Master-based replication: the master server owns the synchronization schedule and pushes modifications to its slaves

• Client-based replication: the slave server owns the synchronization schedule, and pulls modifications from the master server

If you have both LDAP v2 and LDAP v3 servers in your environment, you may lose LDAP v3 specific information when replicating from an LDAP v3 server to an LDAP v2 server. For example, if replicated information makes use of language tags in attributes, all replication targets must support LDAP v3. Refer to the product release notes for details of migration from Sun Directory Services 1.0 to Sun Directory Services 3.1.