<article lang="&language;" id="rdate">
<title
>rdate</title>

<para
> A protocol to retrieve the date and time from a time server. </para>

<para
> It will query a &URL; of an <acronym
>RFC</acronym
> 868 time server. </para>

<para
> The syntax is <userinput
>rdate://servername</userinput
>, and the date will be returned in the format <computeroutput
>DDD MMM DD HH:MM:SS YYYY</computeroutput
></para>

<para
> Network operations require time synchronised information to ensure optimal network performance. </para>

<para
> Computer clocks are notorious for drifting. So it's a very good idea to set up time synchronisation. You will need root privileges to do this. </para>

<para
> See the manual: <ulink url="man:/date"
>date</ulink
> and <ulink url="man:/netdate"
>netdate</ulink
>. </para>

<para
> See : <ulink url="http://www.eecis.udel.edu/~ntp"
> Time Synchronisation Server </ulink
>.</para>

</article>