FreeNAS + OpenLDAP + AFP/TimeMachine backups

[tekkitan]

So I am looking at setting up a FreeNAS server at the office that will handle all of our Macs for backups via Time Machine. I am trying to make the process as automatic as I can to reduce the time needed to configure all of the existing people as well as new people coming in.

I was doing some searching around, but haven't found a lot of info for anyone that has tried this before.

Basically I want to interface FreeNAS with our LDAP server (running OpenLDAP on Ubuntu Server, I know this is possible) and automatically set up the user's Time Machine backup on FreeNAS (maybe based off of an attribute in LDAP?). Then we have an MDM system that works with OS X that will allow us to point all of the systems to a certain Time Machine server as well as quotas and all that.

I guess I'm looking for some guidance on this and also wondering if it's even doable. I've dealt with FreeNAS for a while both at home and here at the office, but mostly only for simple Samba shares or iSCSI for our XenServer environment. I have also set up Time Machine for a Mac I have at home using my home server, but only for one system obviously.

 

[dlavigne]

What solution did you end up with?

 

[tekkitan]

What solution did you end up with?

None yet. Been working on the central management of the 26 Macbooks we just bought

 

[Dave Genton]

I myself am working on this same solution, for many weeks/months now but still hung up on getting freenas to bind via ldap. All other mac machines bind using the SSL Certificate no problem, Freenas only binds with certificate removed at this point so looking for assistance on that portion. I can tell you that once you have added machines into open directory they again get policies and options just like the initial profile for users and groups. However once the machine account is added that profile has extended options and attributes which includes the Timemachine settings you are seeking.