time server via terminal command line?

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time server via terminal command line?

Just as one can obtain their external WAN IP address by using curl -s http://checkip.dyndns.org (or other similar websites), is there an equally cool command to retrieve date/time from an ntp server such as time-a.timefreq.bldrdoc.gov, that anyone knows about?

TIA

2001 Quicksilver G4 (M8360LL/A), Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Posted on Nov 10, 2006 9:44 AM

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Answer 1

Nov 10, 2006 10:16 AM in response to j.v.

ntpdate

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Answer 2

j.v. Author

Level 5

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Nov 10, 2006 11:45 AM in response to Michael Bradshaw

Actually, it looks like sudo ntpdate -u time-a.timefreq.bldrdoc.gov is what is required from the command line

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Answer 3

Camelot

Level 9

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Nov 10, 2006 11:52 AM in response to j.v.

-u instructs ntpdate to use an unprivileged port and shouldn't be necessary in most instances.

That said, by design ntpdate won't make major corrections to the system time other than during boot time due to the fact that big time jumps can often screw up running applications.

Also, there shouldn't be any need to run this manually. You can use System Preferences -> Date & Time to tell the OS to sync with a remote time server. This activates the ntp daemon to correct your clock and keep it in sync.

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Answer 4

j.v. Author

Level 5

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Nov 10, 2006 12:44 PM in response to Camelot

That's correct -- there is no need -- just playin' around in Terminal....

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