{"id":49903,"date":"2010-05-08T00:01:00","date_gmt":"2010-05-08T00:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.technet.microsoft.com\/heyscriptingguy\/2010\/05\/08\/hey-scripting-guy-weekend-scripter-configuring-an-authoritative-time-server-in-windows-server\/"},"modified":"2010-05-08T00:01:00","modified_gmt":"2010-05-08T00:01:00","slug":"hey-scripting-guy-weekend-scripter-configuring-an-authoritative-time-server-in-windows-server","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/hey-scripting-guy-weekend-scripter-configuring-an-authoritative-time-server-in-windows-server\/","title":{"rendered":"Hey, Scripting Guy! Weekend Scripter: Configuring an Authoritative Time Server in Windows Server"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Bookmark<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Microsoft Scripting Guy Ed Wilson here. I finally had a chance to sit down and catch my breath from the 2010 Scripting Games. I reviewed some awesome scripts, and learned many new tricks. I happened to notice that my desktop computer clock was about five minutes slow. I checked and the domain controller was also slow. After looking around, I realized I had never set an external time source for my domain controller\u2014something that was kind of easy to miss because it is running Windows Server 2008 R2 Core Edition. <\/p>\n

After doing a bit of research, I ran across an excellent knowledge base article that talks about configuring an authoritative time server in Windows Server. The article KB816042<\/font><\/a> contains a number of registry entries. Hmm, I thought, an opportunity to write a Windows PowerShell script. <\/p>\n

The complete ConfigureInternetTimeSource.ps1 script is seen here. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ConfigureInternetTimeSource.ps1<\/strong><\/p>\n

Param($computer = “Hyperv”, $user = “nwtraders\\administrator”)
$psSession = New-PSSession -ComputerName $computer -Credential $user <\/p>\n

Invoke-Command -Session $PSSession -ScriptBlock {
 <\/span>$timeRoot = “HKLM:\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\services\\W32Time”
 <\/span>$ntpServer = “time.windows.com,0x1 nist1-ny.ustiming.org,0x1”
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\parameters” -name type -Value “NTP”
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\parameters” -name NtpServer -Value $ntpServer
  <\/span>
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\config” -name AnnounceFlags -Value 5
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\config” -name MaxPosPhaseCorrection -Value 1800
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\config” -name MaxNegPhaseCorrection -Value 1800
    <\/span>
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\TimeProviders\\NtpServer” -name Enabled -Value 1
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\TimeProviders\\NtpClient” -name SpecialPollInterval -Value 900
  <\/span>
 <\/span>Register-WmiEvent -Query `
  <\/span>“select * from __InstanceModificationEvent within 5 where targetinstance isa ‘win32_service'” `
  <\/span>-SourceIdentifier stopped<\/p>\n

 <\/span>Stop-Service -Name w32Time
 <\/span>Wait-Event -SourceIdentifier stopped
 <\/span>Start-Service -Name w32Time
 <\/span>
 <\/span>Unregister-Event -SourceIdentifier stopped
 <\/span>Remove-Event -SourceIdentifier stopped
} # end invoke-command<\/p>\n

Remove-PSSession -Session $psSession<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Because I want to run this script against a remote computer, I create a Windows PowerShell remote session:<\/p>\n

$psSession = New-PSSession -ComputerName $computer -Credential $user<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

After the session has been created, I use it to set the registry keys. But because I want all of my commands to be executed at the same time, I use a single Invoke-Command<\/b> ScriptBlock. The command therefore begins as seen here:<\/p>\n

Invoke-Command -Session $PSSession -ScriptBlock {<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Everything else is basically between the curly brackets for the ScriptBlock. The commands to modify the registry are seen here:<\/p>\n

$timeRoot = “HKLM:\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\services\\W32Time”
 <\/span>$ntpServer = “time.windows.com,0x1 nist1-ny.ustiming.org,0x1”
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\parameters” -name type -Value “NTP”
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\parameters” -name NtpServer -Value $ntpServer
  <\/span>
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\config” -name AnnounceFlags -Value 5
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\config” -name MaxPosPhaseCorrection -Value 1800
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\config” -name MaxNegPhaseCorrection -Value 1800
    <\/span>
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\TimeProviders\\NtpServer” -name Enabled -Value 1
 <\/span>Set-ItemProperty -path “$timeroot\\TimeProviders\\NtpClient” -name SpecialPollInterval -Value 900<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

After the registry entries have been made, it is time to stop and to start the w32time<\/b> service. Before stopping the w32time<\/b> service, I create a temporary WMI event consumer by using the Register-WmiEvent<\/b> cmdlet. This will monitor the status of services on the computer. When an __InstanceModificationEvent<\/b> occurs (such as stopping or starting a service), an event is triggered. The code to do this is seen here:<\/p>\n

Register-WmiEvent -Query `
  <\/span>“select * from __InstanceModificationEvent within 5 where targetinstance isa ‘win32_service'” `
  <\/span>-SourceIdentifier stopped<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Now I stop the w32time<\/b> service, and wait for the WMI event to be generated. After the event has been generated, I know that it is safe to start the service back up again:<\/p>\n

Stop-Service -Name w32Time<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Wait-Event -SourceIdentifier stopped<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Start-Service -Name w32Time<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

The last thing to do is to clean up a little bit by unregistering the event consumer and deleting the events:<\/p>\n

Unregister-Event -SourceIdentifier stopped<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Remove-Event -SourceIdentifier stopped<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

} # end invoke-command<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

When I am finished doing that, I remove the Windows PowerShell session by using the Remove-PSSession<\/b> cmdlet as shown here:<\/p>\n

Remove-PSSession -Session $psSession<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Regedit can be used remotely to view registry keys in Hkey_Local_Machine<\/b> and in Hkey_Users<\/b>. Some of the registry settings modified by the script are seen in the following image.<\/p>\n

\"Image<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/font><\/a><\/p>\n

If you want to know exactly what we will be looking at tomorrow, follow us on Twitter<\/a> or Facebook<\/a>. If you have any questions, send e-mail to us at scripter@microsoft.com<\/font><\/a> or post your questions on the Official Scripting Guys Forum<\/font><\/a>. See you tomorrow. Until then, peace.<\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n

Ed Wilson and Craig Liebendorfer, Scripting Guys<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/b> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Microsoft Scripting Guy Ed Wilson here. I finally had a chance to sit down and catch my breath from the 2010 Scripting Games. I reviewed some awesome scripts, and learned many new tricks. I happened to notice that my desktop computer clock was about five minutes slow. I checked and the domain controller was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":595,"featured_media":87096,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[86,51,31,26,57,3,130,61,45],"class_list":["post-49903","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-scripting","tag-basic-information","tag-getting-started","tag-operating-system","tag-registry","tag-remoting","tag-scripting-guy","tag-servers","tag-weekend-scripter","tag-windows-powershell"],"acf":[],"blog_post_summary":"

  Microsoft Scripting Guy Ed Wilson here. I finally had a chance to sit down and catch my breath from the 2010 Scripting Games. I reviewed some awesome scripts, and learned many new tricks. I happened to notice that my desktop computer clock was about five minutes slow. I checked and the domain controller was […]<\/p>\n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49903","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/595"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49903"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49903\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/scripting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}