Re: [SLUG] Why is time slipping?

From: Eben King (eben01@verizon.net)
Date: Thu Feb 08 2007 - 14:51:05 EST


Sorry for piggybacking, but I don't have the message to which I'm
responding.

> On 2/8/07, Paul M Foster <paulf@quillandmouse.com> wrote:
>>
>> But my understanding of the -g option (per the man page) is that if the
>> time discrepancy exceeds the 1000 second limit, the daemon exits,
>> *unless* this option is specified. This option allows the daemon to set
>> the time value "without restriction".
>>
>> Moreover, if the ntpd daemon periodically checks time and adjusts it,
>> and slews or steps the time (what's the difference?),

If you're e.g. 0:00:02 behind, a slew would make your clock run 2% faster
for 100 seconds. A step would adjust the clock all in one go. The
difference is that with a step, time is gone, and if you have
(poorly-written, IMO) scripts which check [ "`date`" = "string" ], then a
missing time may cause them not to fire.

>> and it keeps being bad, the daemon should be able to query the time
>> servers more frequently. But I can't find an option to increase the
>> frequency with which ntpd consults time servers.

I saw one once, when I was trying to set up ntpd, before Ubuntu did it for
me. The argument was n where it polls the server every 2^n seconds, but I
don't recall the flag. Sorry.

-- 
-eben      QebWenE01R@vTerYizUonI.nOetP      royalty.no-ip.org:81
When we've nuked the world to a cinder, the cockroaches picking
over the remains will be crawling over the remaining artifacts
and wondering what "PC LOAD LETTER" means. -- PC / ASR
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