Clock Synchronization (Overview)

The Network Time Protocol (NTP) public domain software from the University of Delaware is included in the Solaris software from Solaris 2.6 release forward. The xntpd daemon sets and maintains the system time-of-day. The xntpd daemon is a complete implementation of the version 3 standard, as defined by RFC 1305.

The xntpd daemon reads the /etc/inet/ntp.conf file at system startup. See xntpd(1M) for information about configuration options.

Remember the following when using NTP in your network:

• The xntpd daemon uses minimal system resources.

• An NTP client synchronizes automatically with an NTP server when it boots. If the client becomes unsynchronized, the client resynchronizes again when the client contacts a time server.

Another way to synchronize clocks is to run rdate while using cron.