Time server...how to set it up on FC1?

[Rodolfo J. Paiz]

At 06:25 4/13/2004, Markku wrote:
>Rodolfo J. Paiz kirjoitti viestissään (lähetysaika tiistai, 13.
>huhtikuuta 2004 02:27):
> > and then forcefully changes the local system time
> > to whatever result it got from the server, regardless of what
> > that result was and with no sanity checks.
>
>small (<0.5s) clock changes are done by "slewing"
>the clock, not by instantly jumping the clock.

While I simplified the description for the OP (not having that many hours 
to spend on this list), the concept is valid and true. From the ntpdate 
documentation:

"Time adjustments are made by ntpdate in one of two ways. If ntpdate 
determines the clock is in error more than 0.5 second it will simply step 
the time by calling the system settimeofday() routine. If the error is less 
than 0.5 seconds, it will slew the time by calling the system adjtime() 
routine."

The part you left out is the part that agrees with me. Errors of more than 
a half-second (which are pretty darn common on systems whose time has not 
previously been synchronized) are corrected by "instantly jumping the 
clock" in your words. There are no sanity checks on ntpdate by default, 
since I've had ntpdate take a server whose time was SIX YEARS off and 
instantly jump it to the right time. Six years of adjustment in one second 
is what I called forceful. Nothing you've added changes that.

Cheers,


-- 
Rodolfo J. Paiz
rpaiz at simpaticus.com
http://www.simpaticus.com