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ADJTIME(2)                    System Calls Manual                   ADJTIME(2)

NAME
     adjtime - correct the time to allow synchronization of the system clock

LIBRARY
     Standard C Library (libc, -lc)

SYNOPSIS
     #include <sys/time.h>

     int
     adjtime(const struct timeval *delta, struct timeval *olddelta);

DESCRIPTION
     adjtime() makes small adjustments to the system time, as returned by
     gettimeofday(2), advancing or retarding it by the time specified by the
     timeval delta.  If delta is negative, the clock is slowed down by
     incrementing it more slowly than normal until the correction is complete.
     If delta is positive, a larger increment than normal is used.  The skew
     used to perform the correction is generally a fraction of one percent.
     Thus, the time is always a monotonically increasing function.  A time
     correction from an earlier call to adjtime() may not be finished when
     adjtime() is called again.  If olddelta is non-nil, the structure pointed
     to will contain, upon return, the number of microseconds still to be
     corrected from the earlier call.

     This call may be used by time servers that synchronize the clocks of
     computers in a local area network.  Such time servers would slow down the
     clocks of some machines and speed up the clocks of others to bring them
     to the average network time.

     If the calling user is not the super user, the adjtime() system call will
     fail, and the adjtime() function in the standard C library will try to
     use the clockctl(4) device if present, thus making it possible for non
     privileged users to adjust the system time.  If clockctl(4) is not
     present or not accessible, then adjtime() returns EPERM.

RETURN VALUES
     A return value of 0 indicates that the call succeeded.  A return value of
     -1 indicates that an error occurred, and in this case an error code is
     stored in the global variable errno.

ERRORS
     adjtime() will fail if:

     [EFAULT]           An argument points outside the process's allocated
                        address space.

     [EPERM]            The process's effective user ID is not that of the
                        super user.

SEE ALSO
     date(1), gettimeofday(2), clockctl(4), timed(8), timedc(8)

     R. Gusella and S. Zatti, TSP: The Time Synchronization Protocol for UNIX
     4.3BSD.

HISTORY
     The adjtime() function call appeared in 4.3BSD.

NetBSD 10.99                   December 8, 2015                   NetBSD 10.99