DATE(1) (Essential Utilities) DATE(1)
NAME
date - print and set the date
SYNOPSIS
date [+format]
date [mmddhhmm[[yy] | [ccyy]]]
DESCRIPTION
If no argument is given, or if the argument begins with +,
the current date and time are printed. Otherwise, the
current date is set (only by super-user). The first mm is
the month number; dd is the day number in the month; hh is
the hour number (24 hour system); the second mm is the
minute number; cc is the century minus one and is optional;
yy is the last 2 digits of the year number and is optional.
For example:
date 10080045
sets the date to Oct 8, 12:45 AM. The current year is the
default if no year is mentioned. The system operates in
GMT. date takes care of the conversion to and from local
standard and daylight time. Only the super-user may change
the date.
If the argument begins with +, the output of date is under
the control of the user. All output fields are of fixed
size (zero padded if necessary). Each Field Descriptor is
preceded by % and will be replaced in the output by its
corresponding value. A single % is encoded by %%. All
other characters are copied to the output without change.
The string is always terminated with a new-line character.
If the argument contains embedded blanks it must be quoted
(see the EXAMPLE section).
Specifications of native language translations of month and
weekday names are supported. The language used depends on
the value of the environment variable LANGUAGE (see
environ(5)). The month and weekday names used for a
language are taken from strings in the file for that
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DATE(1) (Essential Utilities) DATE(1)
language in the /lib/cftime directory (see cftime(4)).
After successfully setting the date and time, date will
display the new date according to the format defined in the
environment variable CFTIME (see environ(5)).
Field Descriptors (must be preceded by a %):
a abbreviated weekday name
A full weekday name
b abbreviated month name
B full month name
d day of month - 01 to 31
D date as mm/dd/yy
e day of month - 1 to 31 (single digits are preceded
by a blank)
h abbreviated month name (alias for %b)
H hour - 00 to 23
I hour - 01 to 12
j day of year - 001 to 366
m month of year - 01 to 12
M minute - 00 to 59
n insert a new-line character
p string containing ante-meridiem or post-meridiem
indicator (by default, AM or PM)
r time as hh:mm:ss pp where pp is the ante-meridiem
or post-meridiem indicator (by default, AM or PM)
R time as hh:mm
S second - 00 to 59
t insert a tab character
T time as hh:mm:ss
U week number of year (Sunday as the first day of
the week) - 01 to 52
w day of week - Sunday = 0
W week number of year (Monday as the first day of
the week) - 01 to 52
x Country-specific date format
X Country-specific time format
y year within century - 00 to 99
Y year as ccyy (4 digits)
Z timezone name
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DATE(1) (Essential Utilities) DATE(1)
EXAMPLE
date '+DATE: %m/%d/%y%nTIME: %H:%M:%S'
would have generated as output:
DATE: 08/01/76
TIME: 14:45:05
DIAGNOSTICS
No permission if you are not the super-user and you
try to change the date
bad conversion if the date set is syntactically
incorrect
FILES
/dev/kmem
WARNING
Should you need to change the date while the system is
running multi-user, use sysadm(1) datetime.
NOTE
Administrators should note the following: if you attempt to
set the current date to one of the dates that the standard
and alternate time zones change (for example, the date that
daylight time is starting or ending), and you attempt to set
the time to a time in the interval between the end of
standard time and the beginning of the alternate time (or
the end of the alternate time and the beginning of standard
time), the results are unpredictable.
SEE ALSO
sysadm(1).
cftime(4), environ(5) in the System Administrator's
Reference Manual.
Page 3 May 1989