The User Management documentation for 10.4 Server states that Portable Home Directories should not be used instead of backups... I would like to open a discussion on this.
Assume as an administrator, I designate all content within the user's Home directory to be synchronized. Is there a problem with using portable home directories to sync Home with the server, then backup the contents of the server, rather than backing up the contents of each laptop Home directory?
The two points made by Apple are:
* it synchronizes only new and changed files.
* you can not retrieve older versions.
My scenario is that these users would log into the Server network, on occasion, and sync when they wanted to backup. Assuming you have several different backup sets, it would be possible to recover older versions of Home data.
Additionally, these users may be disconnected from the network for extended periods of time -- has anyone encountered authentication issues where a mobile user is locked out of their machine because they are 'off the grid'?