From: "Maciej W. Rozycki" We have a bug in the calculation of the next jiffie to trigger the RTC synchronisation. The aim here is to run sync_cmos_clock() as close as possible to the middle of a second. Which means we want this function to be called less than or equal to half a jiffie away from when now.tv_nsec equals 5e8 (500000000). If this is not the case for a given call to the function, for this purpose instead of updating the RTC we calculate the offset in nanoseconds to the next point in time where now.tv_nsec will be equal 5e8. The calculated offset is then converted to jiffies as these are the unit used by the timer. Hovewer timespec_to_jiffies() used here uses a ceil()-type rounding mode, where the resulting value is rounded up. As a result the range of now.tv_nsec when the timer will trigger is from 5e8 to 5e8 + TICK_NSEC rather than the desired 5e8 - TICK_NSEC / 2 to 5e8 + TICK_NSEC / 2. As a result if for example sync_cmos_clock() happens to be called at the time when now.tv_nsec is between 5e8 + TICK_NSEC / 2 and 5e8 to 5e8 + TICK_NSEC, it will simply be rescheduled HZ jiffies later, falling in the same range of now.tv_nsec again. Similarly for cases offsetted by an integer multiple of TICK_NSEC. This change addresses the problem by subtracting TICK_NSEC / 2 from the nanosecond offset to the next point in time where now.tv_nsec will be equal 5e8, effectively shifting the following rounding in timespec_to_jiffies() so that it produces a rounded-to-nearest result. Signed-off-by: Maciej W. Rozycki Cc: Thomas Gleixner Cc: Roman Zippel Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton --- kernel/time/ntp.c | 2 +- 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-) diff -puN kernel/time/ntp.c~ntp-fix-calculation-of-the-next-jiffie-to-trigger-rtc-sync kernel/time/ntp.c --- a/kernel/time/ntp.c~ntp-fix-calculation-of-the-next-jiffie-to-trigger-rtc-sync +++ a/kernel/time/ntp.c @@ -245,7 +245,7 @@ static void sync_cmos_clock(struct work_ if (abs(now.tv_nsec - (NSEC_PER_SEC / 2)) <= tick_nsec / 2) fail = update_persistent_clock(now); - next.tv_nsec = (NSEC_PER_SEC / 2) - now.tv_nsec; + next.tv_nsec = (NSEC_PER_SEC / 2) - now.tv_nsec - (TICK_NSEC / 2); if (next.tv_nsec <= 0) next.tv_nsec += NSEC_PER_SEC; _