Backing up openldap

Before changing over to "mdb" from "bdb", I ran a script that used slapcat to generate an LDIF file every night. Since updating to "mdb", that script fails if "slapd" is running. That is expected behavior from what I have been reading. http://www.openldap.org/faq/data/cache/288.html

My question is how do I export the directory into an LDIF file if "slapd" is running, or is that not supported? I could easily modify the script to shut down the program, backup the directory in an LDIF format and restart the program; however, that seems overly ambitious. I understand that "replication" is an option, but I don't know if I really want to go that route at this time.