alt Hacker NewsWhite Rabbit – sub-nanosecond synchronization for large distributed systems
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If you run "make" in the papers/IBIC2013 directory you'll get this paper: https://cds.cern.ch/record/1743073/files/thbl2.pdf
It's quite interesting - this isn't ethernet as we know it. Instead of each NIC using its own free-running clock, all the physical layers are sync'ed to each other at layer 1. (note that gigabit ethernet, which is what it uses, sends data at all times - when idle it sends the idle symbol)
Some may find https://gitlab.com/ohwr/project/white-rabbit/-/wikis/home an easier starting point. Particularly the "Synchronization" page.
In short, it's about giving PTP and SyncE some extra smarts.
What is significance of this?
Haven't dug in on the technicals, but this is coming out of CERN, it looks like - and in that light, the links to "We're hiring" on that page almost feel like a flex...
Haven't looked into this in depth but sub-nanosecond sync for systems up to 10km apart is interesting since 10km is about 33 light microseconds. There is some trickery going on.