use strict; use warnings; my $cmd = "/usr/sbin/ntpq -p"; my @ntpout = `$cmd`; die "$cmd failed with: $^E, $?" unless(@ntpout); my $current_time_source = (grep(/^\*/, @ntpout))[0]; die "Not synchronized" unless($current_time_source); my $offset = (split(/\s+/, $current_time_source))[8]; die "$current_time_source: No offset" unless(defined($offset)); print "$offset\n";