Information about the network's clock, ticks, slots, etc.
Time in Solana is marked primarily by slots, which are numbered sequentially. For every slot, a leader is chosen from the validator set, and that leader is expected to produce a new block, though sometimes leaders may fail to do so. Blocks can be identified by their slot number, and some slots do not contain a block.
An approximation of the passage of real-world time can be calculated by
multiplying a number of slots by [DEFAULT_MS_PER_SLOT], which is the SDK's
default target time for the network to produce slots. Note though that this
method suffers a variable amount of drift, as the network does not produce
slots at exactly the target rate. Furthermore, the effective target is changed
dynamically by SIMD-0525, so clients that require the cluster's current value
must not assume the SDK default reflects the cluster.
The network's current view of the real-world time can always be accessed via
[Clock::unix_timestamp], which is produced by an oracle derived from the
validator set.