System and method for measuring clock skew on a network

摘要

A system and method for measuring clock skew in a network is disclosed. The method comprises sending an echo message at a periodic rate from a plurality of servers in the network to an anchor server. A reply message can be sent from the anchor server to each server that includes a remote timestamp based on the anchor server clock. The remote timestamp can be recorded at each of the servers. A send timestamp that designates a time the echo message was sent and a receive timestamp that designates a time the reply message was received at the server can then be recorded. An estimated clock time of each server may also be calculated relative to the anchor server using the send and receive timestamps. A clock skew value can be determined by subtracting the estimated clock time of each server from the remote timestamp time. Interpolation can then performed between the clock skew values over a selected portion of the period of time to enable clock skew values to be estimated over the selected portion of time.