DATE
Section: User Commands (1)
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NAME
date
- display or set date and time
SYNOPSIS
date
[-d dst
]
[-r seconds
]
[-t minutes_west
]
[-nu
]
[+ format
]
[[yy[mm[dd[hh]]]]mm[.ss]]
DESCRIPTION
Date
displays the current date and time when invoked without arguments.
Providing arguments will format the date and time in a user-defined
way or set the date.
Only the superuser may set the date.
The options are as follows:
- -d
-
Set the kernel's value for daylight savings time.
If
dst
is non-zero, future calls
to
gettimeofday(2)
will return a non-zero
`tz_dsttime'
.
- -n
-
The utility
timed(8)
is used to synchronize the clocks on groups of machines.
By default, if
timed
is running,
date
will set the time on all of the machines in the local group.
The
-n
option stops
date
from setting the time for other than the current machine.
- -r
-
Print out the date and time in
seconds
from the Epoch.
- -t
-
Set the kernel's value for minutes west of
GMT
Minutes_west
specifies the number of minutes returned in
`tz_minuteswest'
by future calls to
gettimeofday(2).
- -u
-
Display or set the date in
UCT
(universal) time.
An operand with a leading plus (``+'') sign signals a user-defined format
string which specifies the format in which to display the date and time.
The format string may contain any of the conversion specifications described
in the
strftime(3)
manual page, as well as any arbitrary text.
A <newline> character is always output after the characters specified by
the format string.
The format string for the default display is:
``%a %b %e %H:%M:%S %Z %Y''.
If an operand does not have a leading plus sign, it is interpreted as
a value for setting the system's notion of the current date and time.
The canonical representation for setting the date and time is:
- yy
-
Year in abbreviated form (.e.g 89 for 1989).
- mm
-
Numeric month.
A number from 1 to 12.
- dd
-
Day, a number from 1 to 31.
- hh
-
Hour, a number from 0 to 23.
- mm
-
Minutes, a number from 0 to 59.
- .ss
-
Seconds, a number from 0 to 61 (59 plus a maximum of two leap seconds).
Everything but the minutes is optional.
Time changes for Daylight Saving and Standard time and leap seconds
and years are handled automatically.
EXAMPLES
The command:
date ``+DATE: %m/%d/%y%nTIME: %H:%M:%S''
will display:
DATE: 11/21/87
TIME: 13:36:16
The command:
date 8506131627
sets the date to
``June 13, 1985, 4:27 PM
''
The command:
date 1432
sets the time to
2:32 PM
without modifying the date.
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
The following environment variables affect the execution of
date
- TZ
-
The timezone to use when displaying dates.
See
environ(7)
for more information.
FILES
- /var/log/wtmp
-
A record of date resets and time changes.
- /var/log/messages
-
A record of the user setting the time.
SEE ALSO
gettimeofday(2),
strftime(3),
utmp(5),
timed(8)
-
"TSP: The Time Synchronization Protocol for UNIX 4.3BSD"
R. Gusella
S. Zatti
DIAGNOSTICS
Exit status is 0 on success, 1 if unable to set the date, and 2
if able to set the local date, but unable to set it globally.
Occasionally, when
timed
synchronizes the time on many hosts, the setting of a new time value may
require more than a few seconds.
On these occasions,
date
prints:
`Network'
time being set .
The message
`Communication'
error with timed
occurs when the communication
between
date
and
timed
fails.
BUGS
The system attempts to keep the date in a format closely compatible
with
VMS
VMS
however, uses local time (rather than
GMT
and does not understand daylight-savings time.
Thus, if you use both
UNIX
and
VMS
VMS
will be running on
GMT
STANDARDS
The
date
utility is expected to be compatible with
St -p1003.2 .
Index
- NAME
-
- SYNOPSIS
-
- DESCRIPTION
-
- EXAMPLES
-
- ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
-
- FILES
-
- SEE ALSO
-
- DIAGNOSTICS
-
- BUGS
-
- STANDARDS
-
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Time: 05:08:22 GMT, April 11, 2025