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Ensuring correct system time and date

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    Ensuring correct system time and date

    Hi,

    This isn't an Alpha 5 question per se, but it does relate to the application I have developed in A5. I need to have some sort of controls in place to ensure that time/date stamps are correct. Has anyone done this sort of thing before? The way my application is currently set up, the time/date stamps come from the system time/date which can be reset by anyone familiar with Windows control settings. I found a shareware program on the Internet called Absolute Time Corrector, which queries NIST timeservers using Internet and then compares NIST time to the time set on host computer. Has anyone used it or does anyone have any other suggestions?

    Best regards,
    Robin Sculthorpe

    #2
    RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

    I use a freeware program called about time. I run this on one of the servers and it gets the correct time in whatever protocol you want every few minutes (interval can be set by user). Then I run this on each client machine and set it to grab the time from the server at the interval specified. The program is great and has solved a number of timing issues.

    It's availabel here
    http://www.arachnoid.com/abouttime/

    Russ

    Comment


      #3
      RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

      Thanks, Russ. I will check it out.

      Kind regards,
      Robin

      Comment


        #4
        RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

        Robin

        The US National Institute of Standards has freeware available to synchronize clocks. It can be found on this link

        http://www.boulder.nist.gov/timefreq/service/its.htm

        Jerry

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          #5
          RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

          Thanks

          Also usefull information in the application I have.

          Ed

          Comment


            #6
            RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

            Its good practice to have a central server get time info and then act as a time server for everyone else.

            You might be able to add a Net Time update to the startup script that begins your Alpha App. Have everyone check into the same server, preferably local, when they begin your app.

            Time sync problems are no fun as I'm sure you're dealing with.

            Bo

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              #7
              RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

              Actually, it's not time sync problems that I'm dealing with. It's ensuring data integrity, which is another matter. My application is used for research data and DHHS/FDA has a guidance document regarding the use of computer systems in clinical research. As standards are evolving, it makes things more difficult and now, somehow, I have to ensure that when someone enters data that the time and date are correct. It seems a little extreme to me, because if we were using a paper system, then someone could write any date and time they chose.

              Your suggestion of using a startup script is a good idea, but I still don't know how to prevent someone from changing the system data and time once the application is running. I wonder if there is a way I could generate some sort of log that would show if someone changed the system time and date. Maybe, I could create an alpha function to obtain the date and time and log them while the application is open. (I remember that someone had a program to capture error messages in a log while the application was open.) I will have to keep thinking about this for a while. Maybe, something will come to mind.

              Thanks again,
              Robin

              Comment


                #8
                RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

                Robin

                Preventing a user from changing the data and time may be easy or difficult depending on the tenacity and knowledge of the user and the operating system. Most (if not all) Windows versions allow hiding the clock on the taskbar with a setting in the taskbar configuration. For many users, this would be enough to stop them from changing the time.

                If you get the time from the server, it would be difficult for a user to change the time, unless they had access to the server. The question is how to get the time from the server. If the situation is a standalone, a tenacious user will defeat almost any method since they could change the time before the program opens and there would be no way to trap that.

                Jerry

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                  #9
                  RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

                  See this link on how to prevent users from changing the time.

                  http://security-tips.com/disable-date-time-control-panel.htm

                  I think you can also limit users ability to change time using profiles in Win 98 and above, although I haven't tried it.

                  If used in conjunction with About Time (mentioned previously) you can keep the client machines synched with the time server and the time server synched with NIST or whatever time source you choose to use.

                  Russ

                  Comment


                    #10
                    RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

                    Thanks to all for your suggestions. I will be checking them out.

                    Kind regards,
                    Robin Sculthorpe

                    Comment


                      #11
                      RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

                      I wonder if you could simply rename the file from Alpha when the app begins and restore it when the client leaves?

                      Bo

                      Comment


                        #12
                        RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

                        Robin,

                        There is also one other thing you can do. If each time a major action occurs, a time date stamp is saved, it should always be after the previous one. If not, someone's clock is off or been reset. You can trap this error and handle as you see fit. If I was writing the routine, I'd probably allow times within a couple of minutes of each other, but time should never be jumping back hours. Depending upon frequency of operations, it should also be jumping forward at a somewhat consistent rate, at least at certain times of the day.

                        Regards,

                        Ira
                        Regards,

                        Ira J. Perlow
                        Computer Systems Design


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                          #13
                          RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

                          Bo,

                          That sounds like a good idea. Maybe, I could also synchronize the computer clock to a NIST server in a startup scrip as well.

                          Robin

                          Comment


                            #14
                            RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

                            Ira,

                            I have an autoincremented field for each entry, so I could use that to assess if any time/date stamps are out of sequence according to the autoincrement.

                            Thanks,
                            Robin

                            Comment


                              #15
                              RE: Ensuring correct system time and date

                              Here is how I do it:

                              On the server I run a little custom exe program (created w. Visual DialogScript - about $95). It reads the server date & time every 30 seconds and writes that to a text file on the server. The text file only has one line in it - current date & time. When an Alpha user logs on, A5 reads the text file and logs it in. If the user changes their local system time it doesn't matter (you can track that too of course).

                              FYI: Visual DialogScript is easy to use and can be found at...

                              http://www.dialogscript.com/

                              -Peter
                              Peter
                              AlphaBase Solutions, LLC

                              [email protected]
                              https://www.alphabasesolutions.com


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