[ntp:questions] What does 73.78.73.84 refer to?

Tim tim at mail.localhost.invalid
Tue Nov 8 12:20:44 UTC 2005


I see "73.78.73.84" as the refid for the local clock on one of my
machines (running Fedora Core 4 Linux, if that helps), and I can't figure
out where it gets that from, nor what it means.

This machine is being configured using DHCP, and told to use 192.168.1.2
as it's clock via the DHCP daemon (a local server for the LAN).  The local
clock setting is a manual thing left in so NTP carries on running if the
network is down.

Output from:  ntpq -pn

     remote           refid      st t when poll reach   delay   offset  jitter
==============================================================================
*192.168.1.2     203.217.30.156   2 u   55  512  377    0.830   52.328   4.303
 127.127.1.0     73.78.73.84      5 l   30   64  377    0.000    0.000   0.004


Entire contents of the "/etc/ntp.conf" file (sans the comments):
---------------------------------------------------------------
restrict default nomodify notrap noquery
restrict 127.0.0.1
server 192.168.1.2
server 127.127.1.0
fudge   127.127.1.0 stratum 12
driftfile /var/lib/ntp/drift
broadcastdelay  0.008
keys /etc/ntp/keys

(The "/etc/ntp/ntp-servers" and "/etc/ntp/steptickers" files that Red Hat
based distros like to use are empty files.)

If I stop things being configured via DHCP, manually configure the same
servers, restart the NTP server, I don't get "73.84.73.84" in the output
of ntpq, I get "LOCAL(0)" instead (as I expect).

Someone's bound to comment about me using a stratum 1 server.  I'm
using ntp.pool.org, amongst others, with the 192.168.1.2 machine (its
configuration file below), and someone's put one in there, so they must
want people to use it.


192.168.1.2's "/etc/ntp.conf" file:
----------------------------------
restrict default nomodify notrap noquery
restrict 127.0.0.1

# -- CLIENT NETWORK -------
restrict 192.168.1.0 mask 255.255.255.0 nomodify notrap

# --- OUR TIMESERVERS -----
server au.pool.ntp.org iburst
server time.optusnet.com.au iburst
server pool.ntp.org iburst
server 1.nz.pool.ntp.org iburst
server 127.127.1.0
fudge 127.127.1.0 stratum 9
driftfile /var/lib/ntp/drift
broadcastdelay  0.008
keys /etc/ntp/keys

Again, the "/etc/ntp/ntp-servers" and "/etc/ntp/steptickers" files are
empty files.

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