AIX Tip of the Week

Using timedc and setclock to Display and Synchronize Clocks

Audience: System Administration

Date: March 16, 2001

Clock settings must be synchronized in a client/server architecture to maintain data integrity and to facilitate problem determination. Two common synchronization methods include using a central time server (NTP) or running the timed daemon.

The timed daemon creates an average network time by synchronizing clocks with other systems on the LAN who are running timed. Two useful commands for displaying and setting clocks are timedc and setclock. Here are a couple examples of using each command.

timedc msite - identifies the location of the current timed server.

timedc clockdiff remotehost - display the clock difference between the local host and remotehost.

setclock remotehost - synchronizes the local hosts time/date to that of remotehost


Bruce Spencer,
baspence@us.ibm.com