3 ms·
> My idea was a dedicated, battery-backed piece of hardware that reliably stored time plus could sync other machines. Plugs into an interconnect with ultra-low
by NeutronBoy 11y ago
> My idea was a dedicated, battery-backed piece of hardware that reliably stored time plus could sync other machines. Plugs into an interconnect with ultra-low latency. One for each datacenter.
Google have a variant on this, where they use a GPS receiver in each data centre to provide an accurate time source for local machines.
- dingo_bat 11y agoI've seen this being used extensively in sensor control centers (power grid/power plants), so it's definitely not limited to Google. Basically by accurate and precise timing, they are able to reconstruct and pinpoint the origin of a failure.
- nickpsecurity 11y agoNo, they use a GPS with 7ms time spread for servers as you said. What Im describing is a custom device set against an atomic clock to nano or microsecond accuracy which then does the same to the servers via low latency interconnects. Optionally with time server & dedicated networks for reduced admin overhead. Should do a lot better than 7ms with performance implications.
- packetslave 11y agoIt's actually a mix of GPS and atomic clocks for diversity. See the Spanner paper section on TrueTime for details