You can use the “indirect” method by calling a specific URL from another host on the same /64 subnet. Click on the “X Unverified” link for the server you want to verify to get the URL to use.
Ok done. I’ve used Telnet and curl option. Now its verfied. Yay
Is that what happens? I checked the code (and tested in the development environment). You can always reduce the netspeed; and increasing it should only require that specific server to be verified.
2 Likes
That would be correct, you can’t verify a server from a different network as that would defeat the purpose of showing you own it.
4 Likes
Note to FreeBSD server operators: fetch is installed by default instead of wget and curl. The syntax is almost identical to wget except for inverting the case of the output redirection option:
fetch --bind-address=198.51.100.63 -o- https://validate4.ntppool.dev/b/
2 Likes
The verification is live since a bit over a month now. I would be curious as to some statistics around server verification, if those are available, roughly at least.
E.g., how many/what percentage of servers are verified nowadays, how many “old” servers (those that were registered before the possibility/requirement to verify them) are still out there vs. those that have been verified by now, …
Really, mostly out of curiosity, to get an impression. And I understand this aspect may not yet have reached steady state after only a month. So I am not looking for hard/final numbers, ballpark figures or @ask’s own take on this would do.
Thanks!
Good question, @PoolMUC!
There are 4880 servers in the pool right now (not scheduled for deletion, netspeed over 0, etc). 303 were added since November 1st.
1742 servers have been verified, which is WAY more than I expected so quickly.
My month the number of verifications have been:
November: 771
December: 650
January: 321
… very good so far I think. I expected not much would happen until I emailed operators, etc.
5 Likes
Thanks, @ask, for this insight! Indeed quite interesting and encouraging to hear!
I guess that relates to another question on my mind in this context: A major trigger to introduce server verification was to prevent people adding other people’s servers, especially also more well-known ones, such as those of national metrology or similar institutes, or major Internet companies.
E.g., the only server currently in the Åland Islands zone seems to actually be located in Austria, and to belong to the Austrian metrology institute. Or some of the servers offered by the German PTB, as well as some Polish mobile network operator’s servers and others are registered with a single account. While not completely impossible, obviously, it looks kind of strange. (Maybe one of those accounts is actually used by pool admins to “park”/“reserve” such public servers to prevent them being registered elsewhere, so the heterogeneity of servers under one such account is expected.)
I guess new registrations of such servers will be reduced going forward as validation is needed before more servers can be added to an account, or the bandwidth setting of an unverified server can be increased.
And existing registrations of such servers will eventually peter out in case users want to actively use their accounts, e.g., add further own servers, and cannot do so while having unverified servers under the account.
Or are there plans, alongside eventual “official” communication by e-mail regarding this feature, to eventually enforce verification also of legacy registered servers (i.e., drop them if not verified by a certain deadline)?
Not sure how widespread of an issue this is to warrant enforcing verification also of legacy servers, so I’d be interested in your and other people’s perspective, and your plans in this respect.
@ask in my opinion, give the non-verified servers 3 more months to verify.
If they don’t, just delete them from the database.
It’s not hard to do it, and it works perfect.
You could mark them for deletion in 3 months and mail their are being removed if not verified.
Just like you mail when the server isn’t ticking the tick properly 
Just an idea that come to mind.
Simply do it, and delete all servers that didn’t verify between now and say end of April.
Bas.
I feel stupid - I validated all my servers the other day, but is there a way to see if a server is validated, because I can’t seem to find it for my own servers (unless I log in; only then I see a ‘✓’).
1 Like
or send all server admins a reminder via e-mail.
1 Like
That is what I would have suggested/am aware of.
Where else would you have expected/liked to see such an indication?
On the public pages, like here or here.
I mean (and perhaps I was somewhat unclear on this); this information may be relevant to anyone besides the owner of the server in question. Well, at least as long as not all participating servers are verified by definition that is.
1 Like
Oh, that makes sense. I’ll add that. Thank you.
4 Likes
Good point. I remember wondering about that initially, but have since gotten used to it, at least it doesn’t immediately come to mind anymore.
Hmm, I had been thinking in that direction initially as well, but then wondered whether it was more than curiosity on my part than a real need. Not sure client users would use that info to, e.g., favor verified servers over unverified ones. Server operators already participating in the pool would know if someone else has registered their servers (e.g., in the sense of being unable to register one’s own server as it has been claimed already), and I’d expect such servers to be unverified anyhow. One thing is when unsuspecting third party servers are added to the system. Here, it would help understand whether such a registration is legitimate, or potentially illegitimate. While I could’t immediately do anything about that myself, more people could spot such issues and work with admins to deal with them - for the transition period until such time verification that becomes mandatory.
I’d be curious to learn about other relevant aspects you see for this information to be visible publicly.
1 Like
Thanks for adding the checkmarks on the server details and public user profile pages, @ask!
A mouse-over tooltip such as “Verified server” on the public pages would be helpful. It may not be clear to everyone what this check mark is for.
5 Likes
Why not simply VERIFIED : YES / NO
In my opinion that would be a lot more clear.
And make VERIFIED clickable so it will go to a page where it explains that this is a verified server-owner.
My 2 cts 