[ntp:questions] GettingStarted -- Introduction
Dale Worley
worley at dragon.ariadne.com
Tue Oct 7 16:54:59 UTC 2003
Background:
I'm doing my editing in the Twiki GettingStarted page, and its sandbox
page DaleWorley2, not because I'm choosing that as the Right Way to
distribute the document, but because it is an existing collaboration
tool and the closest equivalent of what I'm attempting to write.
I'm attempting to keep the document format as simple as possible, so
that we can later convert it to text, man, and/or HTML as desired
(preferably automatically).
I've not tackled quick.html because it's an existing distributed
document, and I'm nowhere near the point of saying that I have a
better version. I believe that the new document augments the old one
in that the old one is too terse and omits some important topics.
(I've inserted links to quick.html at the top of the TOC and in the
"Further resources" section.)
Latest change:
I've added an Introduction section. I believe that we need an
Introduction so that we can be sure that naive users understand the
context of what they're attempting to do. You can view it in the
sandbox page (http://twiki.ntp.org/bin/view/Sandbox/DaleWorley2), or
here:
Introduction
The internal clocks of most computers are rather inaccurate. You can
correct the clock by hand on occasion, or you can use NTP to regulate
your clock to be much more accurate.
NTP stands for "Network Time Protocol". It is a way for computers to
exchange information about the exact time, so that they can regulate
their clocks.
NTP also stands for a particular daemon (continuously running program)
that uses the Network Time Protocol to determine the correct time and
regulate your computer's clock to show the correct time. The NTP
daemon software can be obtained from http://www.ntp.org. It runs on
Unix and Windows/NT systems. (There are other programs that use the
Network Time Protocol for setting your computer's clock as well -- see
"Further resources" for information.)
NTP can regulate your clock using a "reference clock", a device that
obtains accurate time information from an outside source and delivers
it to your computer. More commonly, NTP can regulate your clock by
obtaining time information from another NTP daemon. NTP can also
provide time information to other NTP daemons.
Once you install the NTP software and start it running, you must
provide it with a source of time information, either a reference
clock, or with the addresses of other NTP daemons. This document
describes the critical steps of installing the software and
configuring NTP to obtain time from other NTP daemons.
I welcome any comments, particularly if I've not made something clear,
or if I've included extraneous matter.
Oh, yeah, if you have any recommendations for good non-NTP software
that uses NTP, please send me the reference.
Thanks,
Dale
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