Abandoned Insanity

Here’s how to synchronize your Mac’s system time to the nearest atomic clock here in the Philippines…

PAGASA (Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration) Press Release:

DOST-ASTI, through the Philippine Research Education and Government Information Network Project (PREGINET) announces the availability of a Network Time Protocol (NTP) server for public access. This is made possible through a partnership with the Time Service Division of PAGASA. PAGASA, as mandated by law, is the official agency that will disseminate the Philippine Standard Time (PST). In connection with this, PAGASA acquired a Global Positioning System Common View (GPSCV) time transfer system which basically provides a timing signal. The GPSCV is composed of a rubidium clock (used for maintaining accurate time), a computer, and a GPS receiver to receive timing signals from the GPS satellites.

To disseminate the time signal received by the GPSCV system in the Internet, PAGASA designates ASTI and DOST-Bicutan to setup their own public NTP servers that will directly connect to the GPSCV system. PAGASA has one public NTP server (ntp.pagasa.dost.gov.ph) as well, and a web-based time reference at their website. ASTI’s NTP server (ntp2.asti.dost.gov.ph) is now also available and DOST-Bicutan’s will be up and running in the near future.

What is NTP?

NTP is a network protocol that synchronizes clocks of hosts and routers in the Internet. NTP is very useful in applications where time accuracy is very important. It is used in network monitoring and measurements, intrusion detection systems, and cryptographic timestamping services, among others. Furthermore, the fact that everyone who uses the NTP service will now have one unified time reference, there will be no longer any excuse why people should blame time for late appointments, late submission of reports, and generally unsynchronized time references.

How to Avail of the NTP Service:

To avail of the service, one must have a client software that will connect to the NTP server. Open System Preferences, then the Date & Time preference pane… and under Internet Time you can connect to ASTI’s NTP server by specifying its hostname (ntp2.asti.dost.gov.ph) or PAGASA’s (ntp.pagasa.dost.gov.ph) in your configuration.