It's never too much to remember that the only guarantee we can have when dealing with technology services and maintenance procedures on production systems is the backup—straight and simple.

The upgrade process from the Samba Server Version 3 to Version 4 will have a phase where the software's rollback can be a very difficult task or maybe not even possible. So, a backup not just of the Samba Servers involved, but of the domain's other important machines is really crucial too. This is to make sure that the environment can be brought back online to a consistent and operational state at any time.

Another important point in the planning phase is to take into consideration the size and complexity of the network services' environment. We need to consider how many clients, servers (directly or indirectly involved), and how much time is needed (and available) for the upgrade procedure. Different environments may require different approaches, and a big...