[gentoo-user] Hardware clock, software clock and ntpd

[gentoo-user] Hardware clock, software clock and ntpd

[John J. Foster]

Good morning all,

About 10 days ago we had a lightning strike very nearby that fried our 
electric utilities transformer and my APC RS800 UPS. This in turn caused 
my system to crash. When I brought it back up, all CMOS settings had been 
lost. After setting what I could remember (no, I didn't have them written 
down), I brought Gentoo back up. Massive complaints about the time being 
off (I had forgotten to set the hardware clock).

# /etc/init.d/ntpd stop
followed by
# ntpdate pool.ntp.org
set the system time correctly. So I
#/etc/init.d/ntpd start

Since then, ntpd does not work.
According to ps, ntpd is running

//garbanzo/etc # ps aux|grep ntp
root     19874  0.0  0.3   3656  3656 ?        SLs  09:05   0:00 
/usr/sbin/ntpd -p /var/run/ntpd.pid

But all that shows in the /var/log/ntp.log is
12 Jun 09:05:46 ntpd[19515]: ntpd exiting on signal 15

I've also noticed that the software clock is running about 2 minutes fast 
per hour. I know I could setup a cron job to run ntpdate regularly, but 
that is the wrong solution. ntpd had been working fine for years.

Does anyone have any possible ideas what could have happened here?

Thanks,
festus

-- 
It is not unusual for those at the wrong end of the club to have a
clearer picture of reality than those who wield it.
                                                       Noam Chomsky
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Re: [gentoo-user] Hardware clock, software clock and ntpd

[Uwe Thiem]

On 12 June 2006 15:32, John J. Foster wrote:
> Good morning all,
>
> About 10 days ago we had a lightning strike very nearby that fried our
> electric utilities transformer and my APC RS800 UPS. This in turn caused
> my system to crash. When I brought it back up, all CMOS settings had been
> lost. After setting what I could remember (no, I didn't have them written
> down), I brought Gentoo back up. Massive complaints about the time being
> off (I had forgotten to set the hardware clock).
>
> # /etc/init.d/ntpd stop
> followed by
> # ntpdate pool.ntp.org

after this: 
hwclock -wu
to get your hardware clock right. Without "u" if your hw clock is running in 
local time.

> set the system time correctly. So I
> #/etc/init.d/ntpd start
>
> Since then, ntpd does not work.
> According to ps, ntpd is running
>
> //garbanzo/etc # ps aux|grep ntp
> root     19874  0.0  0.3   3656  3656 ?        SLs  09:05   0:00
> /usr/sbin/ntpd -p /var/run/ntpd.pid
>
> But all that shows in the /var/log/ntp.log is
> 12 Jun 09:05:46 ntpd[19515]: ntpd exiting on signal 15

It probably terminated right after your "ps". Would be interesting to know why 
it is terminating. Maybe you should run ntpd in the foreground once:
ntpd -n

Uwe

-- 
Mark Twain: I rather decline two drinks than a German adjective.
http://www.SysEx.com.na
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Re: [gentoo-user] Hardware clock, software clock and ntpd

[John J. Foster]

On Mon, 12 Jun 2006, Uwe Thiem wrote:

<snip>

> after this:
> hwclock -wu
> to get your hardware clock right. Without "u" if your hw clock is running in
> local time.
>
<snip>

>> But all that shows in the /var/log/ntp.log is
>> 12 Jun 09:05:46 ntpd[19515]: ntpd exiting on signal 15
>
> It probably terminated right after your "ps". Would be interesting to know why
> it is terminating. Maybe you should run ntpd in the foreground once:
> ntpd -n
>

Uwe - thanks for the tip on hwclock -wu
The following output is what /var/log/ntp.log looks like after issuing the 
following 2 commands:

#/etc/init.d/ntpd stop
#ntpd -n

12 Jun 14:16:02 ntpd[8885]: ntpd exiting on signal 15
12 Jun 14:20:56 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 212.79.244.34, stratum 2
12 Jun 14:20:56 ntpd[9340]: kernel time sync disabled 0041
12 Jun 14:28:32 ntpd[9340]: kernel time sync enabled 0001

I'll keep an eye on it and let you know.

Thanks,
festus

-- 
It is not unusual for those at the wrong end of the club to have a
clearer picture of reality than those who wield it.
                                                       Noam Chomsky
-- 
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Re: [gentoo-user] Hardware clock, software clock and ntpd

[John J. Foster]

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On Mon, Jun 12, 2006 at 02:52:59PM -0400, John J. Foster wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Jun 2006, Uwe Thiem wrote:
> 
> The following output is what /var/log/ntp.log looks like after issuing the 
> following 2 commands:
> 
> #/etc/init.d/ntpd stop
> #ntpd -n
> 
> 12 Jun 14:16:02 ntpd[8885]: ntpd exiting on signal 15
> 12 Jun 14:20:56 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 212.79.244.34, stratum 2
> 12 Jun 14:20:56 ntpd[9340]: kernel time sync disabled 0041
> 12 Jun 14:28:32 ntpd[9340]: kernel time sync enabled 0001
> 
This is what it looks like as of this morning. I think I'll leave ntpd
running from a console for a day or 2 longer just in case in crashes.

12 Jun 15:49:58 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 209.237.225.10, stratum 3
12 Jun 17:19:47 ntpd[9340]: no servers reachable
12 Jun 17:23:55 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 193.201.52.56, stratum 3
12 Jun 17:29:15 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 212.79.244.34, stratum 2
12 Jun 17:47:31 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 209.237.225.10, stratum 3
12 Jun 17:56:49 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.251.30.199, stratum 3
12 Jun 17:56:52 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
12 Jun 17:56:52 ntpd[9340]: kernel time sync disabled 0041
12 Jun 18:02:15 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
12 Jun 18:03:19 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
12 Jun 18:03:19 ntpd[9340]: kernel time sync enabled 0001
12 Jun 19:35:27 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
12 Jun 19:39:35 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
12 Jun 20:16:03 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
12 Jun 20:24:34 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
12 Jun 21:15:51 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
12 Jun 22:13:27 ntpd[9340]: no servers reachable
12 Jun 22:31:44 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.251.30.199, stratum 3
12 Jun 22:32:40 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
12 Jun 22:39:16 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
13 Jun 00:10:03 ntpd[9340]: no servers reachable
13 Jun 00:13:15 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
13 Jun 00:15:23 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
13 Jun 00:35:46 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
13 Jun 00:37:55 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
13 Jun 02:16:30 ntpd[9340]: no servers reachable
13 Jun 02:20:31 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
13 Jun 02:28:02 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
13 Jun 03:09:48 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
13 Jun 03:37:31 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.251.30.199, stratum 3
13 Jun 04:03:07 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
13 Jun 04:07:25 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.251.30.199, stratum 3
13 Jun 04:37:35 ntpd[9340]: no servers reachable
13 Jun 04:42:43 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
13 Jun 06:05:02 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
13 Jun 06:17:52 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1

Thanks,
festus
-- 
It is not unusual for those at the wrong end of the club to have a
clearer picture of reality than those who wield it.
                                                      Noam Chomsky

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Re: [gentoo-user] Hardware clock, software clock and ntpd

[John J. Foster]

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On Tue, Jun 13, 2006 at 06:39:52AM -0400, John J. Foster wrote:
> On Mon, Jun 12, 2006 at 02:52:59PM -0400, John J. Foster wrote:
> > On Mon, 12 Jun 2006, Uwe Thiem wrote:
> > 
> > The following output is what /var/log/ntp.log looks like after issuing the 
> > following 2 commands:
> > 
> > #/etc/init.d/ntpd stop
> > #ntpd -n
> > 
> > 12 Jun 14:16:02 ntpd[8885]: ntpd exiting on signal 15
> > 12 Jun 14:20:56 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 212.79.244.34, stratum 2
> > 12 Jun 14:20:56 ntpd[9340]: kernel time sync disabled 0041
> > 12 Jun 14:28:32 ntpd[9340]: kernel time sync enabled 0001
> > 
> This is what it looks like as of this morning. I think I'll leave ntpd
> running from a console for a day or 2 longer just in case in crashes.
> 
> 12 Jun 15:49:58 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 209.237.225.10, stratum 3
> 12 Jun 17:19:47 ntpd[9340]: no servers reachable
> 12 Jun 17:23:55 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 193.201.52.56, stratum 3
> 12 Jun 17:29:15 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 212.79.244.34, stratum 2
> 12 Jun 17:47:31 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 209.237.225.10, stratum 3
> 12 Jun 17:56:49 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.251.30.199, stratum 3
> 12 Jun 17:56:52 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
> 12 Jun 17:56:52 ntpd[9340]: kernel time sync disabled 0041
> 12 Jun 18:02:15 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 12 Jun 18:03:19 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
> 12 Jun 18:03:19 ntpd[9340]: kernel time sync enabled 0001
> 12 Jun 19:35:27 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 12 Jun 19:39:35 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
> 12 Jun 20:16:03 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 12 Jun 20:24:34 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
> 12 Jun 21:15:51 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 12 Jun 22:13:27 ntpd[9340]: no servers reachable
> 12 Jun 22:31:44 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.251.30.199, stratum 3
> 12 Jun 22:32:40 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 12 Jun 22:39:16 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
> 13 Jun 00:10:03 ntpd[9340]: no servers reachable
> 13 Jun 00:13:15 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 13 Jun 00:15:23 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
> 13 Jun 00:35:46 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 13 Jun 00:37:55 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
> 13 Jun 02:16:30 ntpd[9340]: no servers reachable
> 13 Jun 02:20:31 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 13 Jun 02:28:02 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
> 13 Jun 03:09:48 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 13 Jun 03:37:31 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.251.30.199, stratum 3
> 13 Jun 04:03:07 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 13 Jun 04:07:25 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.251.30.199, stratum 3
> 13 Jun 04:37:35 ntpd[9340]: no servers reachable
> 13 Jun 04:42:43 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1
> 13 Jun 06:05:02 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.5.1.130, stratum 2
> 13 Jun 06:17:52 ntpd[9340]: synchronized to 64.142.103.194, stratum 1

Well, it's been running fine all day long. I think I'll kill the
commandline ntpd and restart /etc/init.d/ntpd. And watch it for a week
or so.

Thanks again,
festus
-- 
It is not unusual for those at the wrong end of the club to have a
clearer picture of reality than those who wield it.
                                                      Noam Chomsky

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Re: [gentoo-user] Hardware clock, software clock and ntpd

[W.Kenworthy]

You might want to check out the following ntp.conf options depending on
your network link - in particular the panic 0 option or the commandline
version '-g'

tinker panic 0 huffpuff 7200

The huffpuff value seems to help on a loaded broadband connection, and I
found it a must on a modem.  The panic value stops ntp from dropping out
when too great a difference occurs between network and local time (your
original problem I think) - it will step, whereas without it it will
run, but refuse to update the time, or in some cases die.

BillK

On Tue, 2006-06-13 at 22:16 -0400, John J. Foster wrote:
> On Tue, Jun 13, 2006 at 06:39:52AM -0400, John J. Foster wrote:
> > On Mon, Jun 12, 2006 at 02:52:59PM -0400, John J. Foster wrote:
> > > On Mon, 12 Jun 2006, Uwe Thiem wrote:
...
> 
> Well, it's been running fine all day long. I think I'll kill the
> commandline ntpd and restart /etc/init.d/ntpd. And watch it for a week
> or so.
> 
> Thanks again,
> festus
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