Chapter 3. Chrony with hardware timestamping

Procedure

1. Edit the /etc/chrony.conf file and make the following changes:

   1. Add the hwtimestamp setting for interfaces which support hardware timestamping. For example:

      hwtimestamp enp1s0
      hwtimestamp eno*

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      You can use the * wildcard if no other application, such as ptp4l uses hardware timestamping.

   2. Configure a short client polling interval by appending the minpoll and maxpoll options to the server setting, for example:

      server ntp.example.comlocal minpoll 0 maxpoll 0

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      For hardware timestamping, you must configure a shorter polling interval than the default range (64-1024 seconds) to minimize the offset of the system clock.

   3. Enable the NTP interleaved mode by appending the xleave option to the server setting:

      server ntp.example.comlocal minpoll 0 maxpoll 0 xleave

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      With this setting, chrony gets the hardware transmit timestamp only after sending a packet. This behavior prevents the serever from saving the timestamp in packets to which it responds. With the xleave option, chrony can receive transmit timestamps that were generated after the transmission.

   4. Optional: Increase the maximum size of memory allocated for logging of client’s access on the server, for example:

      clientloglimit 100000000

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      The default server configuration allows a few thousands of clients to use the interleaved mode concurrently. By increasing the value of the clientloglimit setting, you can configure the server for a large number of clients.

2. Restart the chronyd service:

   # systemctl restart chronyd

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Verification

1. Optional: Verify in the /var/log/messages log file that hardware timesamping is enabled:

   chronyd[4081]: Enabled HW timestamping on enp1s0
   chronyd[4081]: Enabled HW timestamping on eno1

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2. If chronyd is configured as an NTP client or peer, display the transmit and receive timestamping modes and the interleaved mode:

   # chronyc ntpdata
   
   Remote address  : 203.0.113.15 (CB00710F)
   Remote port     : 123
   Local address   : 203.0.113.74 (CB00714A)
   Leap status     : Normal
   Version         : 4
   Mode            : Server
   Stratum         : 1
   Poll interval   : 0 (1 seconds)
   Precision       : -24 (0.000000060 seconds)
   Root delay      : 0.000015 seconds
   Root dispersion : 0.000015 seconds
   Reference ID    : 47505300 (GPS)
   Reference time  : Wed May 03 13:47:45 2017
   Offset          : -0.000000134 seconds
   Peer delay      : 0.000005396 seconds
   Peer dispersion : 0.000002329 seconds
   Response time   : 0.000152073 seconds
   Jitter asymmetry: +0.00
   NTP tests       : 111 111 1111
   Interleaved     : Yes
   Authenticated   : No
   TX timestamping : Hardware
   RX timestamping : Hardware
   Total TX        : 27
   Total RX        : 27
   Total valid RX  : 27

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3. Report the stability of NTP measurements:

   # chronyc sourcestats
   ....
   
   210 Number of sources = 1
   Name/IP Address            NP  NR  Span  Frequency  Freq Skew  Offset  Std Dev
   ntp.local                  12   7    11     +0.000      0.019     +0ns    49ns
   ....

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Procedure

1. Configure the ptp4l and phc2sys programs from the linuxptp packages to use one interface to synchronize the system clock by using PTP.

2. Configure chronyd to provide the system time by using the other interface:

   bindaddress 203.0.113.74
   hwtimestamp enp1s0
   local stratum 1

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3. Restart the chronyd service:

   # systemctl restart chronyd

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