[ntp:questions] Re: windows 2000 ntp client

Richard B. Gilbert rgilbert88 at comcast.net
Mon Oct 25 19:59:49 UTC 2004


dave wrote:

>Hello,
>    I've got a unix ntp server on my network. It is working fine for local 
>unix clients, i've now added some win2k and winxp boxes that i'd like to use 
>that server for time as well. I've found the win time service, but no docs 
>on it. Does anyone have a howto on this?
>Thanks.
>Dave.
>
>
>  
>
Google for one or more of: "The Windows Time Service", "Sheila 
Brandolini" and/or "Darin Green".   The first is the title of the 
document  you are looking for, the other two are the authors of that 
document.  It should tell you more than you wanted to know.

The one thing it will not tell you is that, outside of Microsoft, the 
Windows Time Service is regarded as seriously broken.  It will cause 
your PC to keep reasonably good time, even very good time.  Among its 
sins: it is an SNTP implementation but not a standards conformant one.  
It is not, according to the standard, supposed to serve time to other 
systems but it will do so.  It claims to be at stratum 2 regardless of 
the source of the time it is serving!  There are probably other problems 
that I have not yet seen discussed.

You can try to ignore the shocked looks and the snickering behind your 
back. . . .




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