date(C) 19 June 1992 date(C) Name date - print and set the date Syntax date [ mmddhhmm[yy] ] [ +format ] Description If no argument is given, or if the argument begins with +, the current date and time are printed as defined by the locale. Otherwise, the current date is set. 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; 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, if the local language is set to English. 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. If the argument begins with +, the output of date is under the control of the user. The format for the output is similar to that of the first argument to printf(S). All output fields are of fixed size (zero padded if necessary). Each field descriptor is preceded by a percent sign ``%'' and will be replaced in the output by its corresponding value. A single percent sign is encoded by doubling the percent sign, that is, by speci- fying ``%%''. All other characters are copied to the output without change. The string is always terminated with a new line character. Field Descriptors: A Full weekday name B Full month name D Date as mm/dd/yy H Hour - 00 to 23 I Hour (12 hour clock) in the range 01 - 12 M Minute - 00 to 59 S Second - 00 to 59 T Time as HH:MM:SS U Week number of the year (Sunday as the first day of the week) as a decimal number in the range 00 - 53 W Week number of the year (Monday as the first day of the week) as a decimal number in the range 00 - 53 X Current time, as defined by the locale Y Year (including century), as decimal numbers Z Timezone name, or no characters if no timezone exists a Abbreviated weekday - Sun to Sat b Abbreviated month name c current date and time, as defined by the locale d Day of month - 01 to 31 h Abbreviated month - Jan to Dec j Day of the year - 001 to 366 m Month of year - 01 to 12 n Inserts a newline character p Equivalent of a.m. or p.m. for current locale r Time in AM/PM notation t Inserts a tab character w Day of the week - Sunday = 0 x Current date, as defined by the locale y Last 2 digits of year - 00 to 99 Example The line date '+DATE: %m/%d/%y%nTIME: %H:%M:%S' generates as output: DATE: 08/01/90 TIME: 14:45:05 Diagnostics no permission You are not the super user and you are trying to change the date. bad conversion The date set is syntactically incorrect. Standards conformance date is conformant with: AT&T SVID Issue 2; and X/Open Portability Guide, Issue 3, 1989.