Werk #20157: Windows time service peers - discover peers which have never synchronized
| Component | Checks & agents | ||
| Title | Windows time service peers - discover peers which have never synchronized | ||
| Date | Jun 28, 2026 | ||
| Level | Trivial Change | ||
| Class | New Feature | ||
| Compatibility | Incompatible - Manual interaction might be required | ||
| Checkmk versions & editions |
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Previously, the summary service Windows time service peers and itemized service Windows time service peer ignored peers which had never synchronized.
These peers are listed in the output of w32tm /query /peers /verbose with the
line "Last Successful Sync Time: (null)".
In the itemized plugin, they were not discovered and in the summary service they were not considered.
This was a monitoring gap that we are now closing.
It is often the case that when the Windows Time Service is restarted, all peers start off with the "(null)" value mentioned above. This is expected until the first sync happens. Therefore, we have introduced new controls:
The rulesets Windows Time service peers and Windows Time service peers summary both now have a new "Elapsed time never having synchronized" rule, which allows you to set a grace period before alerts are generated for peers which have never synchronized.
Additionally, the rulesets allow you to set the default state -- the state that is emitted when the peer has not synced but also not enough time has elapsed that we consider it worthy of attention. This state defaults to OK, so no alerts are generated before the grace period has elapsed.
In the summary service, this default state is considered in conjunction with the other rules, for example "Only alert if all peers are failed".
We mark this change incompatible as new peers may now be discovered and, as a result, may also alert until configured for your environment using the above rulesets.