I've been running NTP on my Linux network at home for years with no problems.

After reading some threads here it appears that the Linode host machines are running NTP and are keeping the Linodes' clocks in synch. I thought it'd be nice to run an NTP server in my Linode that does not synchronize the clock but simply provides the time for other machines.

I'm having trouble getting this working. I set the "disable ntp" flag in ntp.conf so it won't try to change the system clock. I read in the NTP FAQ that I should add the following lines to ntp.conf to make it a "local clock" (not sure why it's necessary, but ok):

server 127.127.1.1              # LCL, local clock
fudge  127.127.1.1 stratum 12   # increase stratum

When I run ntpdate from another machine, ntpdate complains with the so-unhelpful "no server suitable for synchronization found". Okay, BUT WHY? The debug mode of ntpdate gives more information, but nothing I can understand and none of it is explained in the ntpdate documentation:


It seems odd to me that it prints "stratum 16"--based on my ntp.conf I expect "stratum 12".

I'm doing this through a VPN tunnel so there are no firewall issues to get in the way.

I'm running Debian and I've got the ntp-refclock package installed.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Maturin

Well, I've got something working. I never could get ntpdate to work, but I was using it only as a diagnostic anyway.

I redid my ntp.conf, limiting my changes to:

disable ntp
server 127.127.1.1

Instead of ntpdate on the client, I fired up ntpd and gave it plenty of time before trying:


That's all I really wanted, so I'm happy now.

Thanks for listening.

Maturin

I asked about clock synchronisation about 6 months ago.

Chris now ensures clocks are accureate to <1sec.

Cool, thanks.