The firewall between the DMZ and Active Directory's time sources (in another city) wasn't open. Pretty simple (now).
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#Just for those working on configuring RHEL time on their cells, here's a distilled version of what we're doing, so hopefully, it will provide some guidance:
#Configuration of TIME
#Edit the ntp.conf file
#Put the following line at the very top of the ntpd.conf file:
tinker panic 0
Note: The directive tinker panic 0must be at the top of the ntp.conffile. The configuration directive tinker panic 0instructs NTP not to give up if it sees a large jump in time. This is important for coping with large time drifts and also resuming virtual machines from their suspended state.
#Comment out the 3 lines pointing to the "pool" servers and add the following:
server us.pool.ntp.org
#Update the ntpd.conf file to update NTP every 30 minutes:
echo '30 * * * * root /usr/sbin/ntpd -q -u ntp:ntp' > /etc/cron.d/ntpd
#Ensure ntp is set to start with the system
chkconfig ntpd on
#Note: VMware recommends you to use NTP instead of VMware Tools periodic time synchronization. NTP is an industry standard and ensures accurate timekeeping in your guest. You may have to open the firewall (UDP 123) to allow NTP traffic.
#Using RHEL as the OS for the Cells, update the following:
#Edit /etc/ntp/step-tickers:
us.pool.ntp.org
#After making changes to NTP configuration, the NTP daemon must be restarted. Refer to your operating system vendor’s documentation.
service ntpd restart
#Update ntp with the following command
ntpdate –u 0.north-america.pool.ntp.org
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#It is also important not to use the local clock as a time source, often referred to as the Undisciplined Local Clock. NTP has a tendency to fall back to this in preference to the remote servers when there is a large amount of time drift.
#An example of such a configuration is:
server 127.127.1.0
fudge 127.127.1.0 stratum 10
Comment out both lines.
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