[ntp:questions] Re: simple time server

Richard B. Gilbert rgilbert88 at comcast.net
Tue Aug 1 21:26:12 UTC 2006


Bryan Henderson wrote:

> I want a server that simply tells clients when they ask what time it
> is, using the local system time.  Preferably with NTP.  After reading
> a bunch of Ntpd documentation, I thought the undisciplined local clock
> driver might be that, but in experiments, it appears to be quite a bit
> more complex (judging from debug messages, its demanding superuser
> privilege, and the fact that it put my kernel in the hardware clock
> updating mode).
> 
> Ideally, I'd like something simple enough it could even run via Inetd.
> 
> Is there such a program available for Unix?
> 


NTP is a very poor choice for what you want to do.  It does not deal 
with local time at all, it's UTC all the way.

Have you considered using rdate?  See man rdate.

If you are willing to configure your systems properly you can use NTP. 
The clock will keep UTC but the systems will display the local time for 
the time zone you set.  If you have already configured the proper 
timezone the clock is actually keeping UTC not local time.

You might find it simpler to use SNTP on the clients.




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