[ntp:questions] Leap Second Handling

Martin Burnicki martin.burnicki at meinberg.de
Thu Nov 6 13:15:48 UTC 2008


PeterInFrankfurt at gmail.com wrote:
> Can anyone clarify how the leap second is supposed to work?
> 
> We have a GPS receiver which, I understand, already receives the leap
> second indicator LI and knows the leap second will happen end of 2008
> UTC time.
> 
> This GPS receiver speaks IRIG-B with IEEE 1344 extensions to our Time
> Server. IEEE 1344 definition says the Leap Second Pending is set in
> the 59 seconds before the leap second happens.
> 
> So our Time Server will know nothing about the leap second until 59s
> before the year end. By which time, NTP propagation down through the
> stratum hierarchy will fail to notify all NTP clients before the year
> end.
> 
> In this scenario is it necessary to manually insert the leap second
> into the Time Server?

You can download and install the NIST leap second file on your NTP server.
See:
http://support.ntp.org/bin/view/Support/ConfiguringNTP#Section_6.12.

Be sure autokey is enabled since otherwwise the leap second file is not
evaluated.

Martin
-- 
Martin Burnicki

Meinberg Funkuhren
Bad Pyrmont
Germany




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