I have a problem with my hardware clock that I have been unable to resolve. As a work-around I can set the system time correctly if I start a console "su" to root and execute the simple script...

#! /bin/sh
/usr/sbin/ntpdate time.nist.gov

...but regardless of the many different ways I have tried to auto-run this script or to run it as user I always get the error...

ntpdate[3794]: bind() fails: Permission denied

...EVEN when I give the user full privileges on the script, and the executable. I believe that ntpdate might be trying to write to a log file for which the user has no write privelege. I have tried also using "ntpd", modified my /etc/ntp.conf and so on, all to no avail.

Any suggestions?

Only root can update the system clock. Your script must be run as root, always. This is independent of the script's file permissions.

The error that your seeing is because ntpdate by default uses a privileged port (123) and you have to effectively be root in order to open a privileged port, plus on top of that as Mr. C. said in order to update the system clock you have to be root.

Thank you for the concise responses. I can stop wasting time on fixes that won't work.