4.3BSD-UWisc/man/cat1/date.1

DATE(1)             UNIX Programmer's Manual              DATE(1)



NAME
     date - print and set the date

SYNOPSIS
     date [ -n ] [ -u ] [ yymmddhhmm [ .ss ] [ +format ] ]

DESCRIPTION
     If no arguments are given, the current date and time are
     printed.  Providing an argument will set the desired date.
     Only the superuser can set the date.  The -_u flag is used to
     display or set the date in GMT (universal) time.  _y_y
     represents the last two digits of the year; the first _m_m is
     the month number; _d_d is the day number; _h_h is the hour
     number (24 hour system); the second _m_m is the minute number;
     ._s_s is optional and represents the seconds.  For example:

          date 8506131627

     sets the date to June 13 1985, 4:27 PM.  The year, month and
     day may be omitted; the default values will be the current
     ones.  The system operates in GMT.  _D_a_t_e takes care of the
     conversion to and from local standard and daylight-saving
     time.

     If _t_i_m_e_d(_8) is running to synchronize the clocks of machines
     in a local area network, _d_a_t_e sets the time globally on all
     those machines unless the -n option is given.

     If the argument begins with +, the output of _d_a_t_e is under
     the control of the user.  The format for the output is simi-
     lar to that of the first argument to _p_r_i_n_t_f(3S).  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 out-
     put without change.  The string is always terminated with a
     new-line character.

     Field Descriptors:
          n    insert a new-line character
          t    insert a tab character
          m    month of year - 01 to 12
          d    day of month - 01 to 31
          y    last 2 digits of year - 00 to 99
          D    date as mm/dd/yy
          H    hour - 00 to 23
          M    minute - 00 to 59
          S    second - 00 to 59
          T    time as HH:MM:SS
          j    day of year - 001 to 366
          w    day of week - Sunday = 0
          a    abbreviated weekday - Sun to Sat



Printed 12/27/86          May 18, 1986                          1






DATE(1)             UNIX Programmer's Manual              DATE(1)



          h    abbreviated month - Jan to Dec
          r    time in AM/PM notation
          R    month of year in Roman
EXAMPLE
          date '+DATE: %m/%d/%y%nTIME: %H:%M:%S'
     would have generated as output:
          DATE: 08/01/76
          TIME: 14:45:05
FILES
     /usr/adm/wtmp to record time-setting.  In /usr/adm/messages,
     _d_a_t_e records the name of the user setting the time.
SEE ALSO
     gettimeofday(2), utmp(5), timed(8),
     _T_S_P: _T_h_e _T_i_m_e _S_y_n_c_h_r_o_n_i_z_a_t_i_o_n _P_r_o_t_o_c_o_l _f_o_r _U_N_I_X _4._3_B_S_D, R.
     Gusella and S. Zatti
DIAGNOSTICS
     Exit status is 0 on success, 1 on complete failure to set
     the date, and 2 on successfully setting the local date but
     failing globally.
     `You are not superuser: date not set' if you try to change
     the date but are not the super-user.  Occasionally, when
     _t_i_m_e_d synchronizes the time on many hosts, the setting of a
     new time value may require more than a few seconds.  On
     these occasions, _d_a_t_e prints: `Network time being set'.  The
     message `Communication error with timed' occurs when the
     communication between _d_a_t_e and _t_i_m_e_d fails.
LOCAL MODS
     Added the "+format" option.
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-saving time.
     Thus, if you use both UNIX and VMS, VMS will be running on
     GMT.





















Printed 12/27/86          May 18, 1986                          2