Date: Sun, 11 Dec 2005 16:24:55 -0500 (EST) From: Andre Guibert de Bruet <andy@siliconlandmark.com> To: Sten Spans <sten@blinkenlights.nl> Cc: current@freebsd.org Subject: Re: The /etc/ntp/ directory. Message-ID: <20051211161558.Q17429@lexi.siliconlandmark.com> In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOC.4.61.0512111748001.711@tea.blinkenlights.nl> References: <20051211105118.X17429@lexi.siliconlandmark.com> <Pine.SOC.4.61.0512111748001.711@tea.blinkenlights.nl>
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On Sun, 11 Dec 2005, Sten Spans wrote: > On Sun, 11 Dec 2005, Andre Guibert de Bruet wrote: > >> I have a 7.0-CURRENT machine that I have upgraded time and time again, >> since the 5.3-CURRENT days. While looking into setting up ntpd, I came >> across the empty /etc/ntp/ directory. After perusing the man file, and the >> rcNG startup scripts, I don't see anything that makes a reference to this >> directory. The locations that I do find are: >> >> ntpd.conf: /etc/ntpd.conf >> ntp.drift: /var/db/ntpd.drift >> ntpd.pid: /var/run/ntpd.pid >> Docs: /usr/share/doc/ntp >> >> I checked a fresh install of 6.0-RELEASE and this directory appears there >> too but again, without any references. On 4.11-STABLE, it does not exist. >> Is there any use at all for this directory? > > The most common usage is with an ntpd running as user ntp. > This user normally can't write to /var/db/ ( ntpd renames > a temporary ntpd.drift.XXXX to ntpd.drift ). > So ntpd.drift is moved to /etc/ntp where user ntp > does have write permissions. > > Not that FreeBSD supports non-root ntpd (afaik). Thanks for the insight. FreeBSD does not ship with an ntp user. I do however, see the facilities in place in the rcNG script for chrooting. So if ntpd is running as root because clock_settime(2) and friends require the effective user ID of the super-user, what is the functional purpose of this directory? Thanks, Andy /* Andre Guibert de Bruet * 6f43 6564 7020 656f 2e74 4220 7469 6a20 */ /* Code poet / Sysadmin * 636f 656b 2e79 5320 7379 6461 696d 2e6e */ /* GSM: +1 734 846 8758 * 5520 494e 2058 6c73 7565 6874 002e 0000 */ /* WWW: siliconlandmark.com * Tormenting bytes since 1980. */
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