[Xymon] Call for 4.3.29 Patches

[John Thurston]

On 4/11/2019 9:30 AM, Axel Beckert wrote:
. .. .
> One thing I noticed very recently which might be worth considering for
> 4.3.29:
> 
> xymond/etcfiles/xymonserver.cfg.DIST contains:
> 
> NTPDATEOPTS="-u -q -p 1"
> 
> If on the host running xymond, ntpdate from the ntpsec project is
> installed, then I just get the warning:
> 
> $ ntpdate -u -q -p 1 127.0.0.1
> ntpdate: -p is no longer supported.
> 2019-04-11 19:22:28.524619 (-0200) +0.000002 +/- 0.000053 127.0.0.1 s4 no-leap
> $
> 
> So it might be an idea to drop the "-p 1" completely.

That seems premature. The fact that ntpseq has dropped the parameter 
does not make it common or standard.

Dropping the "-p 1" option means ntpdate will attempt to collect more 
than one time sample before returning. In all man pages I've consulted 
the default value for "samples" is 4. Which means that each 
non-answering server will block that xymonnet queue for three additional 
seconds.

If you're using ntpsec, I don't think it is unreasonable to expect you 
to tweak that parameter on your own server. I don't think it is 
reasonable to build in a 4x longer delay for everyone.

--
    Do things because you should, not just because you can.

John Thurston    907-465-8591
John.Thurston at alaska.gov
Department of Administration
State of Alaska