System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
NAME
ntpdc - Network Time Protocol special query program
SYNOPSIS
/usr/sbin/ntpdc [-46lpsidnv?!] [-c command] [-D debuglvl]
[-< optfile] [-> optfile] [host] [...]
OPTIONSSpecifying a command line option other than -i or -n will
cause the specified query (queries) to be sent to the indi-
cated host(s) immediately. Otherwise, ntpdc will attempt to
read interactive format commands from the standard input.-4 Force DNS resolution of following host names on the
command line to the IPv4 namespace.-6 Force DNS resolution of following host names on the
command line to the IPv6 namespace.-c command
The argument command is interpreted as an interactivecommand and is added to the list of commands to be exe-
cuted on the specified host(s). Multiple -c options may
be given.-i Force ntpdc to operate in interactive mode. Prompts
will be written to the standard output and commands read from the standard input.-l Obtain a list of peers which are known to the
server(s). This switch is equivalent to -c listpeers.
-n Output all host addresses in numeric format rather than
converting to the canonical host names.-p Print a list of the peers known to the server as well
as a summary of their state. This is equivalent to -c
peers.-s Print a list of the peers known to the server as well
as a summary of their state, but in a slightly dif-
ferent format than the -p switch. This is equivalent to
-c dmpeers.
DESCRIPTION
ntpdc is used to query the ntpd daemon about its current
state and to request changes in that state. The program maybe run either in interactive mode or controlled using com-
mand line arguments. Extensive state and statistics informa-
tion is available through the ntpdc interface. In addition,
nearly all the configuration options which can be specified at startup using ntpd's configuration file may also be SunOS 5.10 Last change: 1System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
specified at run time using ntpdc. If one or more request
options are included on the command line when ntpdc is exe-
cuted, each of the requests will be sent to the NTP serversrunning on each of the hosts given as command line argu-
ments, or on localhost by default. If no request options aregiven, ntpdc will attempt to read commands from the standard
input and execute these on the NTP server running on the first host given on the command line, again defaulting tolocalhost when no other host is specified. ntpdc will prompt
for commands if the standard input is a terminal device.ntpdc uses NTP mode 7 packets to communicate with the NTP
server, and hence can be used to query any compatible server on the network which permits it. Note that since NTP is a UDP protocol this communication will be somewhat unreliable,especially over large distances in terms of network topol-
ogy. ntpdc makes no attempt to retransmit requests, and will
time requests out if the remote host is not heard from within a suitable timeout time.The operation of ntpdc are specific to the particular imple-
mentation of the ntpd daemon and can be expected to workonly with this and maybe some previous versions of the dae-
mon. Requests from a remote ntpdc program which affect the
state of the local server must be authenticated, which requires both the remote program and local server share a common key and key identifier.Note that in contexts where a host name is expected, a -4
qualifier preceding the host name forces DNS resolution tothe IPv4 namespace, while a -6 qualifier forces DNS resolu-
tion to the IPv6 namespace. Interactive Commands Interactive format commands consist of a keyword followed by zero to four arguments. Only enough characters of the full keyword to uniquely identify the command need be typed. The output of a command is normally sent to the standard output, but optionally the output of individual commands may be sent to a file by appending a >, followed by a file name, to the command line. A number of interactive format commands are executedentirely within the ntpdc program itself and do not result
in NTP mode 7 requests being sent to a server. These are described following.? [ command_keyword ], help [ command_keyword ]
A ? by itself will print a list of all the command key-
words known to this incarnation of ntpq. A ? followed by a command keyword will print function and usage information about the command. This command is probably SunOS 5.10 Last change: 2System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
a better source of information about ntpq than this manual page. delay milliseconds Specify a time interval to be added to timestamps included in requests which require authentication. This is used to enable (unreliable) server reconfiguration over long delay network paths or between machines whose clocks are unsynchronized. Actually the server does not now require timestamps in authenticated requests, so this command may be obsolete. host hostname Set the host to which future queries will be sent. Hostname may be either a host name or a numeric address. hostnames [ yes | no ]If yes is specified, host names are printed in informa-
tion displays. If no is specified, numeric addressesare printed instead. The default is yes, unless modi-
fied using the command line -n switch.
keyid keyid This command allows the specification of a key number to be used to authenticate configuration requests fromntpdc to the host(s). This must correspond to a key
number which the host/server has been configured to use for this purpose (server options: trustedkey, and requestkey). If authentication is not enabled on thehost(s) for ntpdc commands, the command "keyid 0"
should be given; otherwise the keyid of the next subse-
quent addpeer/addserver/broadcast command will be used. quitexit Exit ntpdc.
debug [ no | more | less ]With no parameter displays the current ntpdc debug
level. The no flag turns off all debugging, while more and less increase and decrease the level respectively. passwd This command prompts you to type in a password (which will not be echoed) which will be used to authenticate configuration requests. The password must correspond to the key configured for use by the NTP server for this purpose if such requests are to be successful. timeout milliseconds SunOS 5.10 Last change: 3System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
Specify a timeout period for responses to server queries. The default is about 8000 milliseconds. Notethat since ntpdc retries each query once after a
timeout, the total waiting time for a timeout will be twice the timeout value set. versionDisplay the version of the ntpdc command.
Control Message Commands Query commands result in NTP mode 7 packets containing requests for information being sent to the server. These areread-only commands in that they make no modification of the
server configuration state. listpeers Obtains and prints a brief list of the peers for which the server is maintaining state. These should include all configured peer associations as well as those peers whose stratum is such that they are considered by theserver to be possible future synchronization candi-
dates. peersObtains a list of peers for which the server is main-
taining state, along with a summary of that state. Sum-
mary information includes the address of the remote peer, the local interface address (0.0.0.0 if a local address has yet to be determined), the stratum of the remote peer (a stratum of 16 indicates the remote peer is unsynchronized), the polling interval, in seconds, the reachability register, in octal, and the current estimated delay, offset and dispersion of the peer, all in seconds. The character in the left margin indicates the mode this peer entry is operating in. A + denotessymmetric active, a - indicates symmetric passive, a =
means the remote server is being polled in client mode, a ^ indicates that the server is broadcasting to this address, a ~ denotes that the remote peer is sending broadcasts and a * marks the peer the server is currently synchronizing to. The contents of the host field may be one of four forms. It may be a host name, an IP address, a reference clock implementation name with its parameter or REFCLK(implementation number,parameter) On hostnames no only IP-addresses will be
displayed. dmpeers A slightly different peer summary list. Identical tothe output of the peers command, except for the charac-
ter in the leftmost column. Characters only appear beside peers which were included in the final stage of SunOS 5.10 Last change: 4System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
the clock selection algorithm. A . indicates that this peer was cast off in the falseticker detection, while a + indicates that the peer made it through. A * denotes the peer the server is currently synchronizing with.showpeer peer_address [...]
Shows a detailed display of the current peer variables for one or more peers. Most of these values are described in the NTP Version 2 specification.pstats peer_address [...]
Show per-peer statistic counters associated with the
specified peer(s).clockstat clock_peer_address [...]
Obtain and print information concerning a peer clock. The values obtained provide information on the settingof fudge factors and other clock performance informa-
tion. kerninfoObtain and print kernel phase-lock loop operating
parameters. This information is available if the hostsupports the ntp_adjtime system call.
loopinfo [ oneline | multiline ] Print the values of selected loop filter variables. Theloop filter is the part of NTP which deals with adjust-
ing the local system clock. The offset is the lastoffset given to the loop filter by the packet process-
ing code. The frequency is the frequency error of thelocal clock in parts-per-million (ppm). The time_const
controls the stiffness of the phase-lock loop and thus
the speed at which it can adapt to oscillator drift. The watchdog timer value is the number of seconds which have elapsed since the last sample offset was given to the loop filter. The oneline and multiline options specify the format in which this information is to be printed, with multiline as the default. sysinfo Print a variety of system state variables, i.e., state related to the local server. All except the last four lines are described in the NTP Version 3 specification,RFC-1305. The system flags show various system flags,
some of which can be set and cleared by the enable and disable configuration commands, respectively. These are the auth, bclient, monitor, pll, pps and stats flags. See the ntpd documentation for the meaning of these flags. There are two additional flags which are readonly, the kernel_pll and kernel_pps. These flags indi-
cate the synchronization status when the precision time SunOS 5.10 Last change: 5System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
kernel modifications are in use. The kernel_pll indi-
cates that the local clock is being disciplined by thekernel, while the kernel_pps indicates the kernel dis-
cipline is provided by the PPS signal. The stability is the residual frequency error remaining after the system frequency correction is applied and is intended for maintenance and debugging. In most architectures, this value will initially decrease from as high as 500 ppm to a nominal value in the range .01 to 0.1 ppm. Ifit remains high for some time after starting the dae-
mon, something may be wrong with the local clock, or the value of the kernel variable tick may be incorrect. The broadcastdelay shows the default broadcast delay, as set by the broadcastdelay configuration command. The authdelay shows the default authentication delay, as set by the authdelay configuration command. sysstats Print statistics counters maintained in the protocol module. ctlstats Print statistics counters maintained in the control module. memstats Print statistics counters related to memory allocation code. iostatsPrint statistics counters maintained in the input-
output module. timerstats Print statistics counters maintained in the timer/event queue support code. reslist Obtain and print the server's restriction list. This list is (usually) printed in sorted order and may help to understand how the restrictions are applied. ifstats List interface statistics for interfaces used by ntpd for network communication. ifreload Force rescan of current system interfaces. Outputs interface statistics for interfaces that could possiblychange. Marks unchanged interfaces with ., added inter-
faces with + and deleted interfaces with -.
SunOS 5.10 Last change: 6System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
monlist [ version ]Obtain and print traffic counts collected and main-
tained by the monitor facility. The version number should not normally need to be specified.clkbug clock_peer_address [...]
Obtain debugging information for a reference clock driver. This information is provided only by some clock drivers and is mostly undecodable without a copy of the driver source in hand. Runtime Configuration Requests All requests which cause state changes in the server are authenticated by the server using a configured NTP key (thefacility can also be disabled by the server by not configur-
ing a key). The key number and the corresponding key mustalso be made known to ntpdc. This can be done using the
keyid and passwd commands, the latter of which will prompt at the terminal for a password to use as the encryption key. You will also be prompted automatically for both the key number and password the first time a command which would result in an authenticated request to the server is given. Authentication not only provides verification that the requester has permission to make such changes, but also gives an extra degree of protection against transmission errors. Authenticated requests always include a timestamp in the packet data, which is included in the computation of the authentication code. This timestamp is compared by the server to its receive time stamp. If they differ by more than a small amount the request is rejected. This is done for two reasons. First, it makes simple replay attacks on the server, by someone who might be able to overhear traffic on your LAN, much more difficult. Second, it makes it more difficult to request configuration changes to your server from topologically remote hosts. While the reconfiguration facility will work well with a server on the local host, andmay work adequately between time-synchronized hosts on the
same LAN, it will work very poorly for more distant hosts. As such, if reasonable passwords are chosen, care is taken in the distribution and protection of keys and appropriatesource address restrictions are applied, the run time recon-
figuration facility should provide an adequate level of security. The following commands all make authenticated requests.addpeer peer_address [ keyid ] [ version ]
[ minpoll# | prefer | iburst | burst | minpoll N |
maxpoll N [ dynamic ] [...] ] SunOS 5.10 Last change: 7System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
addpeer peer_address [ prefer | iburst | burst | minpoll N
| maxpoll N | keyid N | version N [...] ] Add a configured peer association at the given address and operating in symmetric active mode. Note that an existing association with the same peer may be deletedwhen this command is executed, or may simply be con-
verted to conform to the new configuration, as appropriate. If the keyid is nonzero, all outgoingpackets to the remote server will have an authentica-
tion field attached encrypted with this key. If the value is 0 (or not given) no authentication will bedone. If ntpdc's key number has not yet been set (e.g.,
by the keyid command), it will be set to this value.The version# can be 1 through 4 and defaults to 3. The
remaining options are either a numeric value for min-
poll# or literals prefer, iburst, burst, minpoll N,
keyid N, version N, or maxpoll N (where N is a numeric value), and have the action as specified in the peer configuration file command of ntpd. See the server options page at file:///usr/share/doc/ntp/confopt.html for further information. Each flag (or its absence) replaces theprevious setting. The prefer keyword indicates a pre-
ferred peer (and thus will be used primarily for clock synchronisation if possible). The preferred peer alsodetermines the validity of the PPS signal - if the pre-
ferred peer is suitable for synchronisation so is the PPS signal. The dynamic keyword allows association configuration even when no suitable network interface is found at configuration time. The dynamic interface update mechanism may complete the configuration whennew interfaces appear (e.g. WLAN/PPP interfaces) at a later time and thus render the association operable.
addserver peer_address [ keyid ] [ version ] [minpoll#
| prefer | iburst | burst | minpoll N | maxpoll N [...] ]addserver peer_address [ prefer | iburst | burst | minpoll N
| maxpoll N | keyid N | version N [...] [ dynamic ] ] Identical to the addpeer command, except that the operating mode is client.addrefclock clock_address [ mode [ prefer | burst | minpoll N
| maxpoll N ...]] Identical to the addpeer command, except that the address is a REFCLOCK designator and it configures a hardware refclock instead of a remote server. SunOS 5.10 Last change: 8System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
broadcast peer_address [ keyid ] [ version ] [ prefer ]
Identical to the addpeer command, except that theoperating mode is broadcast. In this case a valid non-
zero key identifier and key are required. Thepeer_address parameter can be the broadcast address of
the local network or a multicast group address assignedto NTP. If a multicast address, a multicast-capable
kernel is required.unconfig peer_address [...]
This command causes the configured bit to be removed from the specified peer(s). In many cases this will cause the peer association to be deleted. When appropriate, however, the association may persist in anunconfigured mode if the remote peer is willing to con-
tinue on in this fashion.fudge peer_address [ time1 ] [ time2 ] [ stratum ] [ refid ]
This command provides a way to set certain data for a reference clock. See the source listing for further information. pps | stats] enable [ auth | bclient | calibrate | kernel | monitor | ntp | pps | stats] disable [ auth | bclient | calibrate | kernel | monitor | ntp | These commands operate in the same way as the enable and disable configuration file commands of ntpd. See the Miscellaneous Options page for further information. restrict address mask flag [ flag ] This command operates in the same way as the restrict configuration file commands of ntpd. unrestrict address mask flag [ flag ] Unrestrict the matching entry from the restrict list. delrestrict address mask [ ntpport ] Delete the matching entry from the restrict list. readkeys Causes the current set of authentication keys to be purged and a new set to be obtained by rereading the keys file (which must have been specified in the ntpd configuration file). This allows encryption keys to be changed without restarting the server. trustedkey keyid [...] untrustedkey keyid [...] SunOS 5.10 Last change: 9System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
controlkey keyid [...] requestkey keyid [...] These commands operate in the same way as the corresponding configuration file commands of ntpd. keytype md5 This command specifies the default keytype. Since the only type currently support is md5, this is a nop. authinfo Returns information concerning the authentication module, including known keys and counts of encryptions and decryptions which have been done. traps Display the traps set in the server. See the source listing for further information. addtrap [ address [ port ] [ interface ] Set a trap for asynchronous messages. See the source listing for further information. clrtrap [ address [ port ] [ interface] Clear a trap for asynchronous messages. See the source listing for further information. reset Clear the statistics counters in various modules of the server. See the source listing for further information.preset [peer_address [...]]
Clear the statistics counters in various modules of the server with respect to the indicated peers. OPTION PRESETSMost options may be preset by loading values from configura-
tion file(s) and values from environment variables named:NTPDC_
The environmental presets take precedence (are processedor NTPDC later than) the configuration files. The option-name should
be in all capital letters. For example, to set the --
command option, you would set the NTPDC_COMMAND environment
variable. The users home directory and the current direc-
tory are searched for a file named .ntprc.ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attri-
butes: SunOS 5.10 Last change: 10System Administration Commands ntpdc(1M)
____________________________________________
| ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
|____________________|_______________________|_
| Availability | service/network/ntp ||____________________|_______________________|_
| Interface Stability| Uncommitted Obsolete||____________________|______________________|
NOTESSource for ntpdc is available on http://src.opensolaris.org.
SEE ALSO
ntpd(1M), ntpq(1M), ntprc(4), attributes(5) SunOS 5.10 Last change: 11