DATE(1)

DATE(1)                 User Commands                   DATE(1)



NAME
       date - print or set the system date and time

SYNOPSIS
       date [OPTION]... [+FORMAT]
       date [-u|--utc|--universal] [MMDDhhmm[[CC]YY][.ss]]

DESCRIPTION
       Display the current time in the given FORMAT, or set the system date.

       -d, --date=STRING
          display time described by STRING, not ‘now’

       -f, --file=DATEFILE
          like --date once for each line of DATEFILE

       -r, --reference=FILE
          display the last modification time of FILE

       -R, --rfc-2822
          output  date  and time in RFC 2822 format.  Example: Mon, 07 Aug
          2006 12:34:56 -0600

       --rfc-3339=TIMESPEC
          output date and time in RFC 3339 format.    TIMESPEC=‘date’, ‘sec-
          onds’,  or  ‘ns’    for  date and time to the indicated precision.
          Date and time  components     are  separated     by  a    single    space:
          2006-08-07 12:34:56-06:00

       -s, --set=STRING
          set time described by STRING

       -u, --utc, --universal
          print or set Coordinated Universal Time

       --help display this help and exit

       --version
          output version information and exit

       FORMAT controls the output.  Interpreted sequences are:

       %%     a literal %

       %a     locale’s abbreviated weekday name (e.g., Sun)

       %A     locale’s full weekday name (e.g., Sunday)

       %b     locale’s abbreviated month name (e.g., Jan)

       %B     locale’s full month name (e.g., January)

       %c     locale’s date and time (e.g., Thu Mar  3 23:05:25 2005)

       %C     century; like %Y, except omit last two digits (e.g., 20)

       %d     day of month (e.g, 01)

       %D     date; same as %m/%d/%y

       %e     day of month, space padded; same as %_d

       %F     full date; same as %Y-%m-%d

       %g     last two digits of year of ISO week number (see %G)

       %G     year of ISO week number (see %V); normally useful only with %V

       %h     same as %b

       %H     hour (00..23)

       %I     hour (01..12)

       %j     day of year (001..366)

       %k     hour ( 0..23)

       %l     hour ( 1..12)

       %m     month (01..12)

       %M     minute (00..59)

       %n     a newline

       %N     nanoseconds (000000000..999999999)

       %p     locale’s equivalent of either AM or PM; blank if not known

       %P     like %p, but lower case

       %r     locale’s 12-hour clock time (e.g., 11:11:04 PM)

       %R     24-hour hour and minute; same as %H:%M

       %s     seconds since 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC

       %S     second (00..60)

       %t     a tab

       %T     time; same as %H:%M:%S

       %u     day of week (1..7); 1 is Monday

       %U     week number of year, with Sunday as first day of week (00..53)

       %V     ISO week number, with Monday as first day of week (01..53)

       %w     day of week (0..6); 0 is Sunday

       %W     week number of year, with Monday as first day of week (00..53)

       %x     locale’s date representation (e.g., 12/31/99)

       %X     locale’s time representation (e.g., 23:13:48)

       %y     last two digits of year (00..99)

       %Y     year

       %z     +hhmm numeric timezone (e.g., -0400)

       %:z    +hh:mm numeric timezone (e.g., -04:00)

       %::z   +hh:mm:ss numeric time zone (e.g., -04:00:00)

       %:::z  numeric  time  zone  with     :  to necessary precision (e.g., -04,
          +05:30)

       %Z     alphabetic time zone abbreviation (e.g., EDT)

       By default, date     pads  numeric    fields    with  zeroes.    The  following
       optional flags may follow ‘%’:

       -      (hyphen) do not pad the field

       _      (underscore) pad with spaces

       0      (zero) pad with zeros

       ^      use upper case if possible

       #      use opposite case if possible

       After  any  flags  comes     an optional field width, as a decimal number;
       then an optional modifier, which is either E to use the locale’s alter-
       nate  representations  if available, or O to use the locale’s alternate
       numeric symbols if available.

DATE STRING
       The --date=STRING is a mostly free format human    readable  date    string
       such  as     "Sun, 29 Feb 2004 16:21:42 -0800" or "2004-02-29 16:21:42" or
       even "next Thursday".  A date string may contain items indicating  cal-
       endar  date,  time of day, time zone, day of week, relative time, rela-
       tive date, and numbers.    An empty string indicates the beginning of the
       day.   The date string format is more complex than is easily documented
       here but is fully described in the info documentation.

ENVIRONMENT
       TZ     Specifies the timezone, unless overridden by command line param-
          eters.  If neither is specified, the setting from /etc/localtime
          is used.

AUTHOR
       Written by David MacKenzie.

REPORTING BUGS
       Report date bugs to [email protected]
       GNU coreutils home page: <http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
       General help using GNU software: <http://www.gnu.org/gethelp/>
       Report date translation bugs to <http://translationproject.org/team/>

COPYRIGHT
       Copyright © 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.     License  GPLv3+:  GNU
       GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
       This  is     free  software:  you  are free to change and redistribute it.
       There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

SEE ALSO
       The full documentation for date is maintained as a Texinfo manual.   If
       the  info  and  date  programs are properly installed at your site, the
       command

          info coreutils 'date invocation'

       should give you access to the complete manual.



GNU coreutils 8.4           June 2012                   DATE(1)