ntptrace man page is wrong

[JP Vossen]

Binary package hint: ntp

Documentation bug, present on Jaunty, Intrepid, Hardy, and upstream in Lenny and Etch, at least. May be older...

man ntptrace says
[...]
ntptrace [ -vdn ] [ -r retries ] [ -t timeout ] [ server ]

But the only valid options are -n and -m. -m is not even listed and -n is never defined in the man page (actually, almost noting is defined in the man page).

# See the options
[jp@ubuntu-904:T2:L1:C70:J0:2009-03-30_18:05:32_EDT]
/home/jp$ less /usr/bin/ntptrace -N
[...]
     11 $Getopt::Std::STANDARD_HELP_VERSION=1;
     12 getopts('nm:');

# Try some anyway
[jp@ubuntu-904:T2:L1:C67:J0:2009-03-30_17:58:00_EDT]
/home/jp$ ntptrace -v -r1 -t1
Unknown option: v
Unknown option: r
Unknown option: 1
Unknown option: t
Unknown option: 1
localhost: stratum 16, offset 0.000000, synch distance 0.008730

[jp@ubuntu-904:T2:L1:C68:J0:2009-03-30_18:04:38_EDT]
/home/jp$ ntptrace -v -r 1 -t 1
Unknown option: v
Unknown option: r
ntpq: connect: Invalid argument
ntpq -n -c rv 1 failed at /usr/bin/ntptrace line 40.

Expected: the man page should accurately reflect and document the program's available options.

[Chuck Short (zulcss)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. Unfortunately, we can't fix it because your description didn't include enough information. You may find it helpful to read "How to report bugs effectively" http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/bugs.html. We'd be grateful if you would then provide a more complete description of the problem. We have instructions on debugging some types of problems at http://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingProcedures.
At a minimum, we need:
1. the specific steps or actions you took that caused you to encounter the problem,
2. the behavior you expected, and
3. the behavior you actually encountered (in as much detail as possible).
Thanks!

When reporting bugs in the future please use apport, either via the appropriate application's "Help -> Report a Problem" menu or using 'ubuntu-bug' and the name of the package affected. You can learn more about this functionality at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ReportingBugs.

[JP Vossen (jp-jpsdomain)]

1. the specific steps or actions you took that caused you to encounter the problem,

$ man ntptrace
$ ntptrace -v

2. the behavior you expected, and

I expect the man page to be accurate and ideally, useful. Right now it's mostly neither.

3. the behavior you actually encountered (in as much detail as possible).

The man page is NOT accurate, as detailed above. Specifically, the man page claims these options: [ -vdn ] [ -r retries ] [ -t timeout ] [ server ]

But the actual ntptrace program only accepts -n (listed in man but, but no details) and -m (not listed in man page). None of the other options the man page lists, -d, -d, -r, -t are accepted by the program.

Solution: fix the man page so that it documents how the ntptrace program actually works, what options it actually accepts, and what they do.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package ntp - 1:4.2.4p6+dfsg-2ubuntu2

---------------
ntp (1:4.2.4p6+dfsg-2ubuntu2) lucid; urgency=low

  * debian/rules: enable debugging (LP: #47683)
  * debian/ntpdate-if.up: Hide invoke-rc.d output. (LP: #489585)
  * debian/man/ntptrace.1: Update man page removed ghost options. (LP: #351989)
 -- Chuck Short <email address hidden> Mon, 07 Dec 2009 14:59:28 -0500