Warped Clock

**specialk23** · 23-04-2006, 05:06 AM

Greetings all. Since building my Tivo I have had a warped clock problem. This is easily fixed by the steps in FAQ http://minnie.tuhs.org/twiki/bin/vie...aveNoGuideData

However, the same problem occurs about 4 weeks later. Does anyone know how I can permanently fix the problem. Would really appreciate some pointers

Cheers and thanks in advance

**thomson** · 23-04-2006, 07:56 AM

Originally Posted by specialk23

Does anyone know how I can permanently fix the problem.

You could schedule the "fix" every few days via cron. The following crontab entry will perform the actions every morning at 6am:

00 06 * * * (touch /var/timestamp; /hack/bin/force_index.tcl) &

**specialk23** · 23-04-2006, 07:28 PM

via cron.

thanks for that
Not exactly sure what you mean but will do some more reading and try to sort it. Thanks for answering my query

**dyrplq** · 25-04-2006, 09:05 AM

CRON is an automated process that runs command line commands at specified times. To access it;

Telnet into your TiVo
cd /hack/etc/

cp crontab crontab.bak (make a backup of your original file.. just in case

)

joe crontab
This will open your crontab file in the joe editor.

Make sure you leave a blank line at the end of the file otherwise it won't work
once you save it.

Make your changes, then Ctrl-H and Ctrl-S to save.

I don't think you need to reboot your tivo after updating your crontab file, but do it just in case.

Hope this is some help.

**petestrash** · 27-04-2006, 12:32 AM

running the touch command every couple of days will mask the warped clock issue, but does not fix the underlying problem.

Your TiVo is not contacting the timeserver correctly, it's internal clock will drift over time.

Depending on when you imaged your tivo, you may have used an image which contained a faulty ntpdate file. when did you image your TiVo.

The correct file is located here ntpdate.

One way to install is is by typing the following into a telnet session

Code:

cd /bin
rw
mv ntpdate ntpdate.old
wget http://131.244.9.101/twiki/pub/Uploads/WebHome/ntpdate
ro

To test whether your ntpdate file is working (either before or after upgrading it) just type the following into a telnet session.

Code:

 /bin/ntpdate -b 192.43.244.18 129.6.15.29 132.163.4.103

if it works you should get a response showing your current time like.

Code:

gmtime gives    106/3/26 22:26:23  [3]
sending to clock 06/04/26 22:26:23  [3]

Peter.

**specialk23** · 27-04-2006, 05:50 AM

[QUOTE=petestrash]Depending on when you imaged your tivo, you may have used an image which contained a faulty ntpdate file. when did you image your TiVo.

Peter

Thanks fo that. I kind of figured there was something wrong with the image I used. Was planning to re-imagr but will try this first and report back. Thanks for your help

**specialk23** · 27-04-2006, 05:52 AM

dyrplq

Thanks for clarifying Cron. As you can tell I'm not that technical

Regds

specialk

**specialk23** · 27-04-2006, 06:04 PM

[QUOTE=specialk23][QUOTE=petestrash]Depending on when you imaged your tivo, you may have used an image which contained a faulty ntpdate file. when did you image your TiVo.

In November when I first installed Tivo

**petestrash** · 27-04-2006, 07:51 PM

I'm pretty sure it was already fixed by then, I think the bad file was in early 2005 images.

Let's have a look whats happening.

Force a daily call and then look in your otclient.log

scroll down and look for references to ntpdate. You should see a line like

Code:

Apr 27 17:00:37 (none) comm[117]: Setting clock. Command = "/bin/ntpdate -b 192.43.244.18 129.6.15.29 132.163.4.103"

If it's working the next couple of lines should look like

Code:

Apr 27 17:00:37 (none) comm[117]: About to execute: /bin/ntpdate -b 192.43.244.18 129.6.15.29 132.163.4.103 2>&1
Apr 27 17:00:43 (none) comm[117]: Command succeeded

Peter