[ntp:questions] Finding out where ntpd gets its ntp.conf file

David Woolley david at ex.djwhome.demon.co.uk.invalid
Thu Sep 4 22:39:04 UTC 2008


Steve Kostecke wrote:
> 
> And your point is?

My point is that there was reasonable grounds to believe that the OP had
actually looked inside /etc/inet.d/ntpd, but you were telling him how to 
find it.

> 
> It is highly likely that the OP has not bothered to grep the /etc/
> directory for instances of 'ntp.conf'.

He was already aware of /etc/ntp.conf, but assures us that it isn't 
actually used by the ntpd in question.

> 
> That _one_ simple act would render this entire discussion moot because
> it would clearly the ntp.conf file being passed to ntpd.

I believe he has already established that it is not.

 > > [peterc at tantalus ~]$ strings /usr/sbin/ntpd|grep ntp.conf
 > > > /etc/ntp.conf

 > In the RHEL case, this would find exactly the wrong copy of ntp.conf,
 > being the one we were changing to no avail, not the one that NTP was in
 > fact using.

Unfortunately I don't have access to a copy of RHEL and don't even have 
access to earlier versions, at home, without formatting up a partition 
and installing it, so I can't confirm what he is reporting and I'm 
having to rely on my memory of how the start up scripts work.

Typical things that might be done are:

- using the /var tree (7 Google hits for /var/etc/ntp.conf;
- using a sub-directory of /etc (582 for /etc/ntp/ntp.conf; 4 for 
/etc/sysconfig/ntpd.conf; 75 for /etc/config/ntp.conf);
- name variations (3420 /etc/ntpd.conf)
- using a chroot environment (186 for chrooted ntpd, rather more for 
chroot AND ntpd, although there isn't a simple test for filenames;
- linking to /opt, with automatic "repair" of the link (SCO Openserver 
will soft link /opt, but I don't think it would automatically repair).

Even if they are not done for RHEL, he is using multiple systems, and 
they may well be done for some of them.


> 




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