How do I change the time on XFCE's panel clock? An option to adjust the clock doesn't appear to be in a very obvious place, such as the clock's right-click menu or in the control panel. Oddly enough, I'm not finding anything with an internet search either,

The panel clock likely reflects the system clock, so this is about setting the system clock.

When I have to set the clock, I usually use the hwclock command as root to set the hardware clock time, then the hwclock -s command as root to bring the system clock in line with the hardware clock. I poked at this over a period of two weeks once when I was dual-booting Fedora and Slackware to get the two distros to both show the same time, but I finally got it figured out. There are, natch, many other ways to get to the same goal of coordinating the two clocks.

This link gives a pretty good intro to the process. However, I do not use the strings they show as their examples. I'm more likely to use something like this (from the hwclock man page):

If I remember correctly (it's been a while since I've had to do this), this

will change the time without touching the date.

The timezone setting can also come into play, as Linux prefers to be set to UTC, then to use the timezone offset to display the time in local time.

This link may also help.

I generally keep ntp turned on, but make sure it's pointed to benign servers.

This is one of those areas that, because of the variables involved (particularly timezones), can be much more complicated than it looks. In Windows World, the assumption is that everything is always set to local time, so that that variable is removed.

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Try to use ntpd to set time. It keeps UTC date and time in 100s of milliseconds accurate.

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That depends on your distro, which you really ought to indicate when you post a question. Desktop tools are for adjusting the desktop, rather than the system. In Salix, for example, you'd run clocksetup as root, but in the Red Hat family it would be system-config-date.

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Sorry, it's antiX.

In Windows there is an option to set time to UTC actually (through registry).

Before that the OP has to deal with timezones and BIOS time because Linux takes time from BIOS while booting. Of course you can set ntp to correct current time in system everytime after booting the OS, it will still be wrong in “system clock” (BIOS). So after setting correct time in Linux OP has to do something like

or

to save this time to BIOS.

I tried timeconfig and setting the clock to local time doesn't help.(Slackware XFCE)
I even tried setting it to UTC and no dice.

I haven't tried this: (not on my Slack machine tonight)
http://forum.xfce.org/viewtopic.php?id=6799

I'm willing to work with all of you to find a solution.

Nothing I've tried fixes the clock; so far.

frankbell: DavidMcCann & Mr. Alex I'll try what you have advised and get back to you tomorrow.

@newbiesforever:
I know how you feel it's annoying that the clock isn't right.
If you happen to understand the page I linked kindly share the right formula (%H (hour) %M (minute)%S (second) Maybe?

This is the XFCE Clock page that my Slackware takes me to but it is a confusing mess IMO.
How can anyone get the right combinations of the percent signs with the correct characters set and in the right order?
http://docs.xfce.org/xfce/xfce4-panel/clock

I tried:
Only I used todays date (Dec 24, 2014)
Now my clock says 1:46 a.m It's really 8:45 p.m.

I tried :
Clock is still saying 1:46 a.m.

Nothing works for me.

How is the clock working for you; newbiesforever?

Did you fix it?

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Nope...the command above simply didn't work. I have to get into the BIOS next time I reboot, assuming that's where the problem is.

Let me know if going into the BIOS settings (time) makes any difference?