In part related to
----- "Ask Bjørn Hansen" <[email protected]> wrote:
> The current implementation in the system makes the IP stop appearing 
> in DNS 2 weeks before the 'deletion date'.
but I'm wondering about the 'score' which gets displayed on a pool server, and 
whether the calculation needs adjusting.

When a new server is added it arrives with a score of -20 and is allowed to 
improve from there.

If a server goes offline (due to network failure, whatever) instead of there 
being a floor of -20 it keeps on going down throughout the time it is 
uncontactable.

Clearly, there will be cases where a server is still providing time but has a 
wild offset such that the score should decrease without limit, but given that 
there is a blank result when it is entirely offline (so far as the rest of the 
net is concerned, even if it is only a one-way fault) it seems wrong to 
penalise that server subsequently. Similarly, to decrease the score on a curve 
during the offtime at all seems an incorrect conclusion, treating the absence 
as a large offset only and so still serving the IP for the time it takes to 
drop from 20 to 5 when, clearly, a user won't get any reply whatsoever.

I would like to suggest, therefore, that in the case where there is no response 
(for two/three attempts) then instead of reducing the score without limit that 
it is immediately dropped to the 'new server' score of -20, but does not 
decrease any further during the period of the inaccessibility.

Going by the restart curve I see on my own server after a network fail (yes - 
personal interest in this!) this would bring the server back online and 
available to the pool within 6-8 hours, rather than day(s).


Alison Wheeler
http://www.pool.ntp.org/scores/78.33.97.18
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