6.4 XNTPDC

XNTPDC is the remote configuration utility. It is used to query the XNTPD daemon about its current state and to request changes in that state.

If one or more request options are included on the command line when XNTPDC is executed, each of the requests is sent to the NTP servers running on each of the hosts given as command line arguments, or on localhost by default. If no request options are given, XNTPDC attempts to read commands from the standard input and executes these on the NTP server running on the first host given on the command line, again defaulting to localhost when no other host is specified. XNTPDC prompts for commands if the standard input is a terminal device.

The operations of XNTPDC are specific to the particular implementation of the XNTPDC daemon and can be expected to work only with that implementation, and possibly some previous versions of the daemon. Requests from a remote XNTPDC program that affect the state of the local server must be authenticated, which requires both the remote program and local server to share a common key and key identifier.

XNTPDC [ -i lnps ] [ -c command ] [ host ] [ ... ]

Specifying a command line option other than -i or -n causes the specified query (queries) to be sent to the indicated hosts immediately. Otherwise, XNTPDC attempts to read interactive format commands from the standard input.

Table 6-6 XNTPDC Parameters

Parameter

Description

-c command

The following argument is interpreted as an interactive format command and is added to the list of commands to be executed on the specified hosts. Multiple -c options can be given.

-i

Forces XNTPDC to operate in interactive mode. Prompts are written to the standard output and commands are read from the standard input.

-l

Obtains a list of peers known to the servers. This switch is equivalent to -c listpeers.

-n

Outputs all host addresses in dotted-quad numeric format rather than converting to the canonical hostnames.

-p

Displays a list of the peers known to the server as well as a summary of their state. This is equivalent to -c peers.

-s

Displays a list of the peers known to the server as well as a summary of their state, but in a slightly different format than the -p switch. This is equivalent to -c dmpeers.