Set NTP server for 'timesyncd'

[Julen Larrucea]

On Ubuntu 17.04
MaaS 2.2.0~rc1+bzr5922-0ubuntu2

Using a custom (external) NTP server on the MaaS controller causes maas to properly adjust the line,

  server my_ntp.server.com iburst

on the /etc/ntp.conf of the target nodes while commissioning.

But it does not adjust it on the line,

  #NTP=

on the /etc/systemd/timesyncd.conf

Causing the system (systemd-timesyncd) to fall back to ntp.ubuntu.com at the end of the commission.

[Blake Rouse (blake-rouse)]

When ntpd is installed timesyncd should be stopped and not run again as ntpd is now handling that. Are you not seeing that behavior?

[Julen Larrucea (julenl)]

Nope, I mean... I use an External NTP server (in the maas controller settings to be deployed within MaaS).
 When I set the external NTP variable in MaaS, the system is on the right time on the nodes (synchronized with the right server), but at the end, timesyncd still tries to contact the ntp.ubuntu.com.

[Julen Larrucea (julenl)]

I worked around the problem by using a commissioning script, as explained here:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/maas/+bug/1702332/comments/1

But the bug is still there.

[Andres Rodriguez (andreserl)]

I have a question, is this bug for MAAS' running ntpd daemon server (where MAAS runs), or is this for the deployed machines. Based on description this seems for the machines, but the title implies otherwise.

Can you please clarify?

[Andres Rodriguez (andreserl)]

Hi Julen,

The issue that you are running into is a duplicate of the bug above. MAAS uses cloud-init to configure NTP in the deployed machine. Cloud-init configures ntpd. However, due to bug #1597909, timesyncd is not being disabled.

That said, cloud-init will (in the near future) support the use of timesyncd instead. This can be tracked in [1]. Once that happens, MAAS will simply use the newer cloud-init to that purpose.

[1]: https://bugs.launchpad.net/cloud-init/+bug/1686485

[Andres Rodriguez (andreserl)]

FWIW,

I have also confirmed that by default timesyncd will always tries to sync against ntp.ubuntu.com. Then cloud-init will install ntpd which will be configured to reach whatever ntp server is set.

That said, when cloud-init gains support to configure timesyncd, the default behavior will be the same. Timesyncd will try to connect to ntp.ubuntu.com until cloud-init overrides that.