Recommended client setup for internal redundant NTP service #416
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Hello Pendulum project! I just returned from FOSDEM 2026 and your NTS presentation there was the one that got me most hyped up! I operate a 3-node NTP service inside my internal network to sync the time of my homelab. It's based on ntpsec, but based on your FOSDEM talk I will be definitely trying out ntpd-rs soon. The nts-pool public documentation (https://experimental.ntspooltest.org/use) recommends we use the four (4) hostnames (0 to 3.ke.experimental.ntspooltest.org) as servers in our ntpd setup to use the pool. But it kind of assumes the client has a single node. What is the recommended setup for cases like mine where 3 different NTP servers are used as clients? Based on how the non-NTS NTP pool works, I instinctively tried to separate the four hostnames among my servers. So I am currently trying 0.ke.experimental.ntspooltest.org on my 1st server, 1.ke.experimental.ntspooltest.org on my 2nd and the rest two on my 3rd server. Is this the recommended setup? I am noticing that the different pool hostnames can sometimes return the same NTS server, which I think would work OK on a single client because the client would get rid of duplicates. But separate clients will not. Related to this, when I try out ntpd-rs soon, I will try to set it up using an NTS pool instead of server entries. What is the recommended setup then? Only setup the NTS pool on one of my 3 servers or set it up on all of them? Thank you very much for your attention. I share your enthousiasm and highly appreciate your efforts in making time secure! |
Replies: 1 comment 1 reply
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Hi Tvenieris, The split in separate domain names still has some overlap because we are running currently with a configuration of the pool suitable for a smaller amount of servers. We have just passed the boundaries where we can actually make them disjunct, and are planning to do so in the next few days-week or 2, so the duplicates will hopefully disappear for you soon. As for setup for multi-server internal network setups, I would recommend just having all 3 servers synchronize to all 4 pool domain names. There is no real problem with having the 3 servers share time sources so long as they individually still have sufficiently many to get reliable time. |
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Thank you very much for the quick response! |
Hi Tvenieris,
The split in separate domain names still has some overlap because we are running currently with a configuration of the pool suitable for a smaller amount of servers. We have just passed the boundaries where we can actually make them disjunct, and are planning to do so in the next few days-week or 2, so the duplicates will hopefully disappear for you soon.
As for setup for multi-server internal network setups, I would recommend just having all 3 servers synchronize to all 4 pool domain names. There is no real problem with having the 3 servers share time sources so long as they individually still have sufficiently many to get reliable time.