Depending on what RISC OS system you are using, it’s possible that it doesn’t have a battery backed system clock. It’s also possible that it does have one, but the battery isn’t as reliable as it once was. In either case, you might find that whenever you switch the machine on, the computer might be a little confused about the time and date.
It’s common now to have the computer check the time via the internet and set (or adjust) the clock accordingly, which would be one way around the problem – but that isn’t a perfect solution; what if for some reason you don’t have an internet connection, for example?
With such problems in mind, Herbert Zur Nedden has come up with a small command line tool designed to check the time against the last time the computer was booted and the program run.
Called ClockWork – because it’s checking to see if the clock is working – the program will do nothing if the current time looks sensible compared to the last time it was checked. However, if the time appears to be earlier than when it was last booted, ClockWork will alert you to the issue.
It will also alert you if the time difference is greater than 28 days in the other direction – i.e. if the computer thinks it’s more than 28 days since you last used it – which might indicate the clock running too fast. On the other hand, that could also be a good reminder that you need to use your RISC OS computer more often.
