> I've wondered every now and then about the reason for having the pid
> file on the command line, and now this.  
..
> I know this is easy to override, but am curious for the reasoning...

Well, the main thing instigating this was that Thor and I discovered
today that xntpd won't use the kernel PLL support unless you specify a
driftfile.

As we don't ship a default ntp.conf file, putting these options on the
command line makes it more likely that the "right thing" will happen.
moreover, with xntpd -m or xntpd -b for multicast/broadcast NTP, you
don't need to configure any peers so you can do all the configuration
on the command line.

					- Bill