On Wednesday 03 December 2003 16:38, Donn aka n5xwb Washburn wrote:

I have had the same problem with SuSE 9.0. It seems that no matter I how I set "localtime" and set the time via netdate on the internet at bootup it always goes to UTC time. So, if I reboot several times the "date" becomes days behind.

I have wriiten SuSE's Support about this issue and NO HELP! And this may be my last SuSE version. On 9.0 I have had more problems than on any other SuSE distros. Like "time" and my Palm device not being seen. However, hwinfo, /proc and "lsusb" does see it

I have written to SuSe help as well, so I'll wait and see what comes out of it. I'm still confused by this "English sentence": In order to maintain the time as precise as possible, this procedure shall be repeated several times the week after at the soonest. I presume they mean that I have to do the same thing ( what was suggested on their help page) several times this week and ASAP. And I also presume that when I do this it will make changes to /etc/adjtime. But what will happen if I reboot several times in that week? I'm not to worried about it , to be honest. I just brought it up because of the bad English translation. -- Greetings from /bill at 169 west , 19 south. Disclaimer: Any errors in spelling, tact, or fact are transmission errors."

On Thursday 04 December 2003 09:46, Carlos E. R. wrote:

The Wednesday 2003-12-03 at 17:17 -1100, Bill Wisse wrote:

...

I'm still confused by this "English sentence": In order to maintain the time as precise as possible, this procedure shall be repeated several times the week after at the soonest.

I presume they mean that I have to do the same thing ( what was suggested on their help page) several times this week and ASAP.

NO!

It says to wait at least one week before repeating.

Ok, Ok I'll do that ;-))

...

And I also presume that when I do this it will make changes to /etc/adjtime.

Right.

-- Greetings from /bill at 169 west , 19 south. Disclaimer: Any errors in spelling, tact, or fact are transmission errors."

On Thursday 04 December 2003 17:15, Donn aka n5xwb Washburn wrote:

Snip Well I have zeroed the /etc/adjtime and made sure the last line was set to localtime before I shutdown this machine.

I set the time with "netdate navobs1.wustl.edu now.cis.okstate.edu" and then ran "/sbin/hwclock --adjust --localtime ; hwclock --systohc"

I just got home and fired this system up and the time/date is 22:02 PM 12/04/2003. However, "date" shows Thu Dec 4 16:02:12 CST 2003.

I just ran both of the above commands and now the time is Thu Dec 4 22:04:39 CST 2003

It is a screwed up /etc/init.d file that is causing the problem. /etc/adjtime and/or /etc/localtime is the result of the headache. This only happens at bootup so it must be a boot script problem.

Something like "date -u" would cause the problem because it is 6 hours wrong every boot time. So, reboot in one day 4 times and the DAY will even be wrong.

I just rebooted and the time comes up allright. I'm waiting if Carlos E R will send me some info about the email he wrote before I do anything else. BTW do you get a message ( when you start up) like , couldn't start clock, segmentation fault, FAILED? Because that is what I'm getting. -- Greetings from /bill at 169 west , 19 south. Disclaimer: Any errors in spelling, tact, or fact are transmission errors."

The Thursday 2003-12-04 at 22:15 -0600, Donn aka n5xwb Washburn wrote:

Well I have zeroed the /etc/adjtime

Simply delete it.

and made sure the last line was set to localtime before I shutdown this machine.

Almost useless. The file is recreated on certain circumstances; for example, if you delete it, the '/etc/init.d/boot.clock' will recreate it this way: echo -n Setting up the CMOS clock test -f /etc/adjtime || echo "0.0 0 0.0" > /etc/adjtime /sbin/hwclock --adjust $HWCLOCK rc_status /sbin/hwclock --hctosys $HWCLOCK rc_status rc_status -v -r The variable $HWCLOCK is defined in '/etc/sysconfig/clock', and that is the place to define UTC or local time. I have as UTC, thus: # Set to "-u" if your system clock is set to UTC, and to "--localtime" # if your clock runs that way. # HWCLOCK="-u" So, simply deleting the '/etc/adjtime' file will recreate it correctly next time you boot. And, when you power off, the script '/etc/init.d/halt' executes this: if test "$HWCLOCK_ACCESS" != "no" ; then if rc_active xntpd ; then echo -n "Set Hardware Clock to the current System Time" # write back to hardware clock and calculate adjtime /sbin/hwclock --systohc $HWCLOCK rc_status -v -r fi fi (rc_active is a function that tests for the existence of the given script on any runlevel) Meaning: if the network time daemon was set to be activated (and therefore, the clock can be assumed to be correct) the system time is copied to the CMOS clock.

I set the time with "netdate navobs1.wustl.edu now.cis.okstate.edu"

The SuSE way is "rcxntpd ntptimeset" - you only need to put the servers in '/etc/ntp.conf' for it to work.

and then ran "/sbin/hwclock --adjust --localtime ; hwclock --systohc"

Correct... :-? Well, no, not the adjust, see below. But ensure you have 'HWCLOCK="-u"' in '/etc/sysconfig/clock'.

I just got home and fired this system up and the time/date is 22:02 PM 12/04/2003. However, "date" shows Thu Dec 4 16:02:12 CST 2003.

Who says it is 22.02? Kde perhaps? That is a very different problem, ignore it. The "date" command is the important one. It appears to be the UTC time. Notice that "netdate" adjusts to UTC time, but it knows what is the difference between your local time and UTC, so there should be no problem.

I just ran both of the above commands and now the time is Thu Dec 4 22:04:39 CST 2003

It is a screwed up /etc/init.d file that is causing the problem. /etc/adjtime and/or /etc/localtime is the result of the headache. This only happens at bootup so it must be a boot script problem.

Something like "date -u" would cause the problem because it is 6 hours wrong every boot time. So, reboot in one day 4 times and the DAY will even be wrong.

Ok, try this. Ensure the HWCLOCK variable is correct, and that your system is set to the proper timezone. Delete the adjtime file and reboot when you like. Enter the Bios, and adjust the clock there (this is the safest way, or at least, most intuitive). Continue booting (that day, the next, doesn't matter). Then use the adjusting procedure you used: rcxntpd ntptimeset hwclock --systohc skipping the --adjust, because the boot script did it for us, and, most important, because it will adjust the CMOS clock by what it assumes will have drifted - and thus undoing the network time adjust. That option is meant (IMO) to be used when not having a network clock for reference. In other words. When you are booting up, the line: /sbin/hwclock --adjust $HWCLOCK corrects the CMOS clock by the amount stored in '/etc/adjtime'. Then the line: /sbin/hwclock --hctosys $HWCLOCK copies the CMOS clock to the system. Thus, you should not use "--adjust" after adjusting the clock with a network reference: you compound the error. If the clock is updated by six hours, and you do it improperly, that may be stored in the adjtime file... Mmmm... I don't know if I manage to explain it, or to muddle it up more for you - it's late here O:-) -- Cheers, Carlos Robinson

On Thursday 04 December 2003 06:44 am, Bruce Marshall wrote:

On Wed December 3 2003 10:38 pm, Donn aka n5xwb Washburn wrote:

...

Bill Wisse wrote:

...

Hi

I had ( and maybe have) a problem with the time on my SuSE 9.0 box. The time is just wrong and I cannot change it ( it won't accept my changes). Went to the data base for assistance and found an article http://portal.suse.com/sdb/en/2002/06/bjacke_hwclock.html Did what was suggested , the time changed ( don't know yet what it will be after a reboot). However there is one sentence in this art. what sort of puzzles me :

In order to maintain the time as precise as possible, this procedure shall be repeated several times the week after at the soonest.

Any Idea?

I have had the same problem with SuSE 9.0. It seems that no matter I how I set "localtime" and set the time via netdate on the internet at bootup it always goes to UTC time. So, if I reboot several times the "date" becomes days behind.

I have wriiten SuSE's Support about this issue and NO HELP! And this may be my last SuSE version. On 9.0 I have had more problems than on any other SuSE distros. Like "time" and my Palm device not being seen. However, hwinfo, /proc and "lsusb" does see it

I did dig around in /etc/init.d and found the problem (at least I think so) in /etc/init.d/boot.clock (as I remember). It was a problem with "date -u"

Have none of you ever heard of NTP? I set my watch by my computer whereas I used to use WWV....

NTP is very easy to set up on SUSE. If you want my /etc/ntp.conf file I'll be glad to send it. That's the only thing you need to change once ntpd is installed.

When I reboot my time is always five minutes off. I want your /etc/ntp.conf file. Thanks, Jerome

The Thursday 2003-12-04 at 15:25 -1100, Bill Wisse wrote:

...

Did you read my long email about this? It explains this. I simply refuse to write it up again every week...

No I didn't. I Googled for some help and also used lists site:lists.suse.com as advised on suse-linux-e help, but I must have used different keywords because nothing came up. After that I contacted SuSE for help but they haven't responded yet. Could you give me hint where to find this email?

Tsk, tsk... If messages were wolves, you'd be bitten ;-) It is very recent, but I have written on this subject several times. You only have to browse this month archive and you will see two or three. I assume you have been subscribed for some time, because I see messages from you dated November, so you should have a local copy of the las 15 days messages, at least, don't you? If not, a quick browse on lists.suse.com (text search function on any browser, even "links") and you will see it. Let me see... |> Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2003 23:59:41 +0100 (CET) |> From: Carlos E. R. |> Subject: Re: [SLE] time not working |> X-Message-Number-for-archive: 170053 Another one: |> Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2003 01:29:31 +0100 (CET) |> From: Carlos E. R. |> Subject: Re: [SLE] CMOS clock being set incorrectly |> X-Message-Number-for-archive: 169751 Now, how can you get mails referred by ID? Well, when you subscribed you got a greetings email, with a small FAQ - you read it, of course? No? Ok, well, it says: |> Q4. How can I retrieve the FAQ? |> A4. Send an email to suse-linux-e-faq_at_suse.com and: |> To get message 12 from the archive, send a message to: |> This is expanded in the full FAQ: |> To get messages 123 through 145 (a maximum of 100 per request), mail: |> |> |> To get an index with subject and author for messages 123-456, mail: |> |> |> To receive all messages with the same subject as message 12345, |> send an empty message to: |> |> |> The messages do not really need to be empty, but I will ignore |> their content. Only the ADDRESS you send to is important. So, you have several methods of finding those messages. Try it! :-) After you get those messages - which, anyways, you should have locally, they are from less than a week old - you will see they both mention older messages: 168643 and 169751. Both point to this one: |> Date: Sun, 23 Nov 2003 13:57:21 +0100 (CET) |> From: Carlos E. R. |> Subject: Re: [SLE] Computer can't keep time |> X-Message-Number-for-archive: 168643 This one (the one GarUlbricht refers on his mail on this thread talks about so kindly) refers (and repeats) what I posted on some older mails: |> Date: Sat, 19 Apr 2003 20:50:45 +0200 (CEST) |> From: Carlos E. R. |> Subject: Re: [SLE] SuSE8.2 won't keep time |> X-Message-Number-for-archive: 141227 |> Date: Tue, 22 Apr 2003 02:05:36 +0200 (CEST) |> From: Carlos E. R. |> Subject: Re: [SLE] SuSE8.2 won't keep time |> X-Message-Number-for-archive: 141609 Well, I'm going to have my dinner or supper or whatever now, and send this later. Go get them (the whole threads would be better - try to sort your list mail by threads, by the way), and after you read them I hope the situation will be clarified as to how SuSE set up the clock, and how you should adjust them. When you understand and follow that writeup, if your clock is still failing, we'll try to investigate more and see what may be happening.

...

...

However there is one sentence in this art. what sort of puzzles me :

In order to maintain the time as precise as possible, this procedure shall be repeated several times the week after at the soonest.

It tells you that you should repeat the synchronization procedure not earlier than a week later.

I'm glad you can make something out of this, because I cannot.

English is becoming an international intermediate language (not Esperanto, but...) to which we add our own national idiosyncrasies. SuSE people add their own German taste, I guess :-) It is not my own language, either. -- Cheers, Carlos Robinson