[ntp:questions] (Software) timeserver for windows being broadcast-able incl. keys

Ryan Malayter malayter at gmail.com
Sun Mar 18 12:43:39 UTC 2007


On Mar 18, 12:09 am, Tom Smith <s... at cag.zko.hp.com> wrote:

> He can change the server - address(es)/netmask(s), maybe add NICs -
> and maybe he can change the router configuration. What he can't
> change at the moment is the clients, so he's stuck with trying
> to find a broadcast solution that hits 4 different subnets of
> different sizes.
>
> I'm sure Erik would rather be doing something else by now. :-)

Agreed. I'd work with the manufacturer to change the clients; surely
other customers of theirs have the similar issues. Erik really needs a
unicast or multicast setup for NTP because the network topology.

If the clients absolutely cannot change for any reason, the final
option would be a "brute force" approach: actually put a physical NTP
server (old junk PC running Linux or *BSD) in each of the four
subnets. Have each of these broadcast to its local subnet, while
getting the time from your main time server (and some other time
sources from off-network).

If money isn't an issue, you could even get some nice little Soekris
or Gumstix boxes to be time servers for each subnet. This could be
cheaper and easier than re-architecting the network topology to be
"flatter".

Regards,
  Ryan




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