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The maxinaccuracy Attribute

The maxinaccuracy attribute specifies the greatest allowable bound on your system's inaccuracy before DTS causes the system to synchronize. When the system exceeds the bound determined by the maxinaccuracy attribute setting, DTS forces the system to synchronize until the inaccuracy is reduced to a level that is at or below the setting. Use the maxinaccuracy attribute setting as a trigger for synchronization. You can vary the setting to vary the tolerance of intersystem synchronizations, but be aware that as the setting becomes lower, network overhead rises. The default setting is 0.10 seconds (100 milliseconds).

The effects of the maxinaccuracy attribute setting on the system's synchronization behavior are the following:

1. The system's clock value accumulates more inaccuracy than the maxinaccuracy attribute value and DTS initiates a synchronization.

2. DTS computes a new time value.

3. DTS adjusts the system clock.

4. If the new clock setting still exceeds the maxinaccuracy attribute value, or if clock drift later causes the inaccuracy to reach the value, the cycle is repeated.

Note that if synchronization repeatedly fails to achieve an inaccuracy that is less than the maxinaccuracy attribute value, the system can be continuously synchronizing. (See The syncinterval Attribute for information on how the syncinterval attribute prevents this loop.)

The default maxinaccuracy attribute value is designed to keep the system accurate enough for most applications without being intrusive to network communications or system processing. If your network includes one or more time-providers that ensure extremely low inaccuracy, you can lower the maxinaccuracy attribute value. Raise the value in the following cases:

· If a time-provider is not used in the network

· If a system is part of a WAN-only network configuration

· If the applications that call DTS do not require the level of precision achieved by the default setting

The following example shows how to change the maxinaccuracy attribute value to 0.2 seconds:

dcecp> dts modify -change {maxinaccuracy 00-00:00:00.200}
dcecp>