NTP

This role was created to set the ntp server to "ntp.trifence.ch" and as fallback "ntp.3eck.net", set the timezone to Europe/Zurich and reloads the chrony service. The "ntp.trifence.ch" and "ntp.3eck.net" ntp serer are used prefered because they support nts, but to prevent a egg/chicken scenario with tls (which needs a more or less accurate time & date) we also use a second fallback cleartext ntp server --> time.ethz.ch

General

This role consists of four main steps:

• install chrony

- name: "install chrony"
  ansible.builtin.package:
    name: chrony
    state: latest
  become: true

• Copy chrony.conf template to /etc/chrony/

#Copy chrony.conf template file to /etc/chrony/
- name: "Copy chrony.conf template to /etc/chrony/chrony.conf
  template:
    src: chrony.conf
    dest: /etc/chrony/chrony.conf
    owner: root
    group: root
    mode: 0644
    force: yes
  become: true

• The chrony.conf template templates the following:

# First nts (tls secured) ntp server
server {{ ntp_primary_server }} iburst nts prefer

# Second nts (tls secured) ntp server
server {{ ntp_fallback_server }} iburst nts prefer

# Third ntp server, but without tls
server {{ ntp_secondary_fallback_server }} iburst 

Set timezone to Europe/Zurich

• name: Set timezone to Europe/Zurich community.general.timezone: name: Europe/Zurich

Restart chrony.service

• name: "Restart chrony.service" ansible.builtin.systemd: name: chrony state: restarted

- or, for chrony < version 4 the chrony.conf template templates the following:

only ntp server, without tls, since it is only support > version 4.0

server {{ ntp_legacy_server }} iburst

#Set timezone to Europe/Zurich
- name: Set timezone to Europe/Zurich
  community.general.timezone:
    name: Europe/Zurich

#Restart chrony.service
- name: "Restart chrony.service"
  ansible.builtin.systemd:
    name: chrony
    state: restarted 

Dependencies

Role Dependencies

Package Dependencies

Role Variables

Name	Type	Default value	Purpose	Comment	Role
ntp_conf	Boolean	false	If set to true, the ntp role will be executed (Opt-in)	-	ntp
ntp_primary_server	String	"ntp.trifence.ch"	Primary ntp server (nts)	time.ethz.ch does not support nts	ntp
ntp_fallback_server	String	"ntp.3eck.net"	Fallback ntp server (nts)	time.ethz.ch does not support nts	ntp
ntp_secondary_fallback_server	String	"time.ethz,ch"	Fallback ntp server (ntp (without tls))	time.ethz.ch does not support nts, but we use a 3 cleartext server as fallback	ntp
ntp_legacy	Boolean	false	If set to true, the old/legacy config file for versions <4.0 will be templated	-	ntp
ntp_legacy_server	String	"time.ethz,ch"	legacy ntp server (ntp (without tls))	time.ethz.ch does not support nts, but we use a cleartext server since chrony <version 4.0 does NOT support ntsecure	ntp
ntp_timezone	String	"Europe/Zurich"	Sets the timezone to Europe/Zurich, but can be changed to whatever you want	-	ntp

Example Playbook

Including an example of how to use your role (for instance, with variables passed in as parameters) is always nice for users too:

- hosts: servers
  roles:
     - { ntp: ntp, nts, time }

License

BSD

Author Information

Maintainer: Niels Dill, Niklaus Kappeler (chrony rewrite)

Support-Contact: s4d-linux-support@id.ethz.ch