V10/man/man1/chdate.1

.TH CHDATE 1
.CT 1 files dirs
.SH NAME
touch, chdate \- set modification or access date of a file
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B touch
[
.B -c
]
.I file ...
.PP
.B chdate
[
.B -am
]
.I date file ...
.SH DESCRIPTION
.I Touch
attempts to set the modification time of the
.I files
to the current time.
If a
.I file
does not exist,
it will be created unless option
.B -c
is present.
.PP
.I Chdate
sets the access and modification times of
.I files.
The 
.I date
comprises two or more arguments: a month (3 letters or more),
a day number, an optional time in hour:min[:sec] form, and an
optional year.
A missing year means a time in the last 12 months.
The options are
.TP
.B -a
Change the access time only.
.TP
.B -m
Change the modification time only.
.PP
.I Chdate
knows how to carry between fields of a date.
Only a file's owner or the super-user can change its date.
.SH EXAMPLES
.EX
.ta \w'chdate jul 4 12:00 1976 independence 'u
chdate jul 4 12:00 1976 independence
chdate jul -3 1976 independence	# backdate one week
.EE
.SH SEE ALSO
.IR ls (1),
.IR utime
in
.IR chmod (2),
.IR stat (2),
.IR timec (3),
.IR chmod (1),
.IR chown (8)
.SH DIAGNOSTICS
.I Chdate
returns the number of files on which the date
could not be changed.
.SH BUGS
.I Touch
will not touch directories.
.PP
The first
.I file
name for 
.I chdate
cannot begin with a digit.