[CentOS] System Time Source

Wed May 24 14:17:09 UTC 2017
m.roth at 5-cent.us <m.roth at 5-cent.us>

Chris Olson wrote:
> One of our STEM interns recently observed that there are
> inexpensive clocks that sync via radio to standard time
> services.  This begged a question about why every computer
> would not have a radio module to receive time.  Our senior
> staff did not have a good answer or if time from such a
> radio module would be supported by the operating system.
>
> When I was a student, such questions would have earned me
> extra homework assignments.  We now have only PC directed
> relationships with interns so we don't assign any extra
> homework for curiosity.  Can anyone help with the answers?
>
Because we connect directly to a known time server, which are all synced
with the atomic clocks of places like the NIST, or Greenwich, etc. This is
what NTP or chrony is for.

Why add a radio receiver when you're already online, and can connect to
one from the US federal gov't?

      mark