Re: FreeBSD 6.0-RC1 available

"Scott Long" <scottl_at_samsco.org> wrote in message 
news:434BEC96.4050801_at_samsco.org...
> Joshua Coombs wrote:
>
>> Given that we're in the RC stage, is it too late to get a PR 
>> stuffed in to correct ntpd/ntpdate behavior in /etc/rc.d?
>>
>> Joshua Coombs
>>
>
> Depends on the kind of problem that you are seeing.  Any details?
>
> Scott

Two issues I spotted.

First, ntpdate is still being used, despite it being marked as 
depreciated for quite some time.  The preferred replacement is to call 
ntpd with the -q switch.  This causes ntpd to match ntpdate's 
behavior, it sets the time, and then exits with a status code 
indicating success or failure.

Second, when ntpdate, or what ever is set in ntpdate_program is 
called, there is an IP appended to the end of the arguments, which is 
not controlled by ntpdate_flags.  This means you cannot setup ntpd -q 
to be used in place of ntpdate without editing the ntpdate rc.d script 
or creating a new one, a regression from 4.x's setup.

I see some effort was put into the new ntpdate rc.d script, having it 
pull potential servers from /etc/ntp.conf rather than require the user 
specify one in rc.conf using ntpdate_flags.  ntpd called with -q uses 
the ntp.conf server entries automatically, so the extra work by the 
rc.d script isn't required if we switch to ntpd -q in place of 
ntpdate.

I was going to work up a tweaked ntpdate rc.d script that included a 
new option, ntpdate_use_ntpd, that when set, would use the preferred 
practice of calling ntpd -q after verifying a valid ntp.conf exists. 
If one isn't present, I was going to have it throw a warning, and 
reference an example conf using pool.ntp.org servers to get baseline 
time established.  The ntpd rc.d script would receive the same check, 
the example conf would lock ntpd down such that it would only operate 
as a client for the local machine, and not act as a server for 
external hosts, or respond to external ntp query/command/conf 
requests.

Unfortunately, I'm getting into this rather late, I just moved my 386 
to 6.0b5 this weekend, hence my tardiness discovering ntpdate still in 
use in later releases of FreeBSD.  I would like to see the correct 
behavior implemented for release, but if I'm beyond the deadline for 
this level of change, I'll accept that and work on making it the norm 
for 6.1.

Joshua Coombs