Traces a chain of Network Time Protocol (NTP) hosts back to their master time source.
ntptrace [ -n ] [ server ]
The ntptrace command determines the time source for the Network Time Protocol (NTP) server and follows the chain of NTP servers back to their master time source. If no arguments are provided, it starts with localhost. Following is an example of the output of the ntptrace command:
% ntptrace
localhost: stratum 4, offset 0.0019529, synch distance 0.144135
server2ozo.com: stratum 2, offset 0.0124263, synch distance 0.115784
usndh.edu: stratum 1, offset 0.0019298, synch distance 0.011993, refid 'WWVB'
On each line, the fields from left to right are host name, host stratum, time offset between that host and the local host as measured by the ntptrace command. This is why it is not always zero for "localhost", host synchronization distance, and (applies only for the stratum-1 servers) the reference clock ID. All times are given in seconds. Note that the stratum is the server hop count to the primary source, while the synchronization distance is the estimated error relative to the primary source. These terms are precisely defined in RFC-1305.
Item | Description |
---|---|
-n | Turns off the printing of host names; instead, host IP addresses are printed. This may be useful if a nameserver is down. |
Item | Description |
---|---|
Server | Specifies the server. The default is the local host. |
This command returns the following exit values:
Item | Description |
---|---|
0 | Successful completion |
>0 | An error occurred |
Access Control: You must be part of the system group to run this command.
Auditing Events: N/A
ntptrace
Output similar to the following appears:
loopback: stratum 5, offset 0.000076, synch distance 0.18291
ganga08.in.ibm.com: stratum 4, offset -0.001854, synch distance 0.30600
ganga10.in.ibm.com: stratum 3, offset 0.000251, synch distance 0.30550
ausgsa.austin.ibm.com: stratum 2, offset -0.010158, synch distance 0.01921
gsantp.austin.ibm.com: stratum 1, offset 0.016067, synch distance 0.00000, refid
'GPS'
Item | Description |
---|---|
/usr/sbin/ntp4/ntptrace4 | Contains the ntptrace command. Default Symbolic link to NTP version 3 binary from /usr/sbin directory. /usr/sbin/ntptrace --> /usr/sbin/ntp3/ntptrace |