Possible abuse from fetching the leap second file

[Eric S. Raymond]

Hal Murray <hmurray at megapathdsl.net>:
> Matt Selsky is working on Pythonizing the script that grabs a new leap second 
> file.  The idea is to run a cron job that keeps it up to date.  That opens an 
> interesting can of worms.
> 
> As a general rule, you shouldn't use a resource on a system that you don't 
> own without permission from the owner.  Informed consent might be a better 
> term.  A system open to occasional  downloads by a human might not be willing 
> to support automated fetches from many many systems.

While I accept this as a general principle, is there anything about the
new ntpleapfetch that inflicts a heavier load than the old ntpleapfetch
has been causing for decades with the tolerance of NIST and USNO?

If not, then I think we get to mutter "customary usage" and move on.

I will also note that the GPSD build process has actually been doing
something very like ntpleapfetch (to get the current leap-second so
it can be compiled into the build) for about a decade.  I didn't see
it as a potential problem when I wrote it, and nobody associated with
the targeted servers has ever complained to me.
-- 
		<a href="http://www.catb.org/~esr/">Eric S. Raymond</a>