[TriLUG] How to get ntpd to work

[Glenn Meyer]

A few tools I use to see if it's actually working are:

ntpdate -u timeservername
ntpq -p
ntptrace




Matt Pusateri wrote:

>On Mon, March 21, 2005 2:03 pm, Randall Barlow said:
>  
>
>>Well, I have another time related question.  How do you get ntpd to
>>work?  I have it starting up on boot fine (says "OK").  I also have
>>the
>>ntpd.conf file set up with the line "servers pool.ntp.org" so that it
>>picks the servers randomly.  And I also have the line in rc.conf that
>>says 'ntpd_flags=""' (without the single quotes...).  However, my
>>computer is still behind by about 4 minutes.  Anything I forgot?
>>
>>    
>>
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>
>
>First does your ntp.drift file exist?  ntpd will usually not start nor
>will it create the drift file.  So normally you need to touch the file
>first before ntpd will work.
>
>This doesn't fix your problem.  But ntp.org now has 3 sets of rotating
>ntp server pools labeled 0, 1, and 2.  and you can also restrict down
>to just the US by a us prefix.
>
>So servers would then be.
>
>0.us.pool.ntp.org
>1.us.pool.ntp.org
>2.us.pool.ntp.org
>
>Also someone correct me if I am wrong, but normally you want more than
>1 servers line in your ntpd.conf.  Putting multiple servers lines,
>lets ntp query multiple servers and then synchronize time more
>efficiently by using some algorithm.  I always heard you want to pull
>time from one stratum 1 and two stratum two servers.  But is
>definitely a better idea to pull time from multiple servers.
>
>Also if you are not setting any flags in the rc.conf file for ntp why
>bother having the line at all unless you are trying to negate out some
>default flags.
>
>
>
>Matt
>
>  
>