1DATE(1)                          User Commands                         DATE(1)
2
3
4

NAME

6       date - print or set the system date and time
7

SYNOPSIS

9       date [OPTION]... [+FORMAT]
10       date [-u|--utc|--universal] [MMDDhhmm[[CC]YY][.ss]]
11

DESCRIPTION

13       Display the current time in the given FORMAT, or set the system date.
14
15       Mandatory  arguments  to  long  options are mandatory for short options
16       too.
17
18       -d, --date=STRING
19              display time described by STRING, not 'now'
20
21       -f, --file=DATEFILE
22              like --date once for each line of DATEFILE
23
24       -I[TIMESPEC], --iso-8601[=TIMESPEC]
25              output date/time in ISO 8601 format.  TIMESPEC='date'  for  date
26              only  (the  default), 'hours', 'minutes', 'seconds', or 'ns' for
27              date and time to the indicated precision.
28
29       -r, --reference=FILE
30              display the last modification time of FILE
31
32       -R, --rfc-2822
33              output date and time in RFC 2822 format.  Example: Mon,  07  Aug
34              2006 12:34:56 -0600
35
36       --rfc-3339=TIMESPEC
37              output date and time in RFC 3339 format.  TIMESPEC='date', 'sec‐
38              onds', or 'ns' for date and time  to  the  indicated  precision.
39              Date  and  time  components  are  separated  by  a single space:
40              2006-08-07 12:34:56-06:00
41
42       -s, --set=STRING
43              set time described by STRING
44
45       -u, --utc, --universal
46              print or set Coordinated Universal Time (UTC)
47
48       --help display this help and exit
49
50       --version
51              output version information and exit
52
53       FORMAT controls the output.  Interpreted sequences are:
54
55       %%     a literal %
56
57       %a     locale's abbreviated weekday name (e.g., Sun)
58
59       %A     locale's full weekday name (e.g., Sunday)
60
61       %b     locale's abbreviated month name (e.g., Jan)
62
63       %B     locale's full month name (e.g., January)
64
65       %c     locale's date and time (e.g., Thu Mar  3 23:05:25 2005)
66
67       %C     century; like %Y, except omit last two digits (e.g., 20)
68
69       %d     day of month (e.g., 01)
70
71       %D     date; same as %m/%d/%y
72
73       %e     day of month, space padded; same as %_d
74
75       %F     full date; same as %Y-%m-%d
76
77       %g     last two digits of year of ISO week number (see %G)
78
79       %G     year of ISO week number (see %V); normally useful only with %V
80
81       %h     same as %b
82
83       %H     hour (00..23)
84
85       %I     hour (01..12)
86
87       %j     day of year (001..366)
88
89       %k     hour, space padded ( 0..23); same as %_H
90
91       %l     hour, space padded ( 1..12); same as %_I
92
93       %m     month (01..12)
94
95       %M     minute (00..59)
96
97       %n     a newline
98
99       %N     nanoseconds (000000000..999999999)
100
101       %p     locale's equivalent of either AM or PM; blank if not known
102
103       %P     like %p, but lower case
104
105       %r     locale's 12-hour clock time (e.g., 11:11:04 PM)
106
107       %R     24-hour hour and minute; same as %H:%M
108
109       %s     seconds since 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
110
111       %S     second (00..60)
112
113       %t     a tab
114
115       %T     time; same as %H:%M:%S
116
117       %u     day of week (1..7); 1 is Monday
118
119       %U     week number of year, with Sunday as first day of week (00..53)
120
121       %V     ISO week number, with Monday as first day of week (01..53)
122
123       %w     day of week (0..6); 0 is Sunday
124
125       %W     week number of year, with Monday as first day of week (00..53)
126
127       %x     locale's date representation (e.g., 12/31/99)
128
129       %X     locale's time representation (e.g., 23:13:48)
130
131       %y     last two digits of year (00..99)
132
133       %Y     year
134
135       %z     +hhmm numeric time zone (e.g., -0400)
136
137       %:z    +hh:mm numeric time zone (e.g., -04:00)
138
139       %::z   +hh:mm:ss numeric time zone (e.g., -04:00:00)
140
141       %:::z  numeric time zone with :  to  necessary  precision  (e.g.,  -04,
142              +05:30)
143
144       %Z     alphabetic time zone abbreviation (e.g., EDT)
145
146       By  default,  date  pads  numeric  fields  with  zeroes.  The following
147       optional flags may follow '%':
148
149       -      (hyphen) do not pad the field
150
151       _      (underscore) pad with spaces
152
153       0      (zero) pad with zeros
154
155       ^      use upper case if possible
156
157       #      use opposite case if possible
158
159       After any flags comes an optional field width,  as  a  decimal  number;
160       then an optional modifier, which is either E to use the locale's alter‐
161       nate representations if available, or O to use the  locale's  alternate
162       numeric symbols if available.
163

ENVIRONMENT

165       TZ     Specifies the timezone, unless overridden by command line param‐
166              eters.  If neither is specified, the setting from /etc/localtime
167              is used.
168

EXAMPLES

170       Convert seconds since the epoch (1970-01-01 UTC) to a date
171
172              $ date --date='@2147483647'
173
174       Show the time on the west coast of the US (use tzselect(1) to find TZ)
175
176              $ TZ='America/Los_Angeles' date
177
178       Show the local time for 9AM next Friday on the west coast of the US
179
180              $ date --date='TZ="America/Los_Angeles" 09:00 next Fri'
181
182       GNU  coreutils  online  help:  <http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
183       Report date translation bugs to <http://translationproject.org/team/>
184

DATE STRING

186       The --date=STRING is a mostly free format human  readable  date  string
187       such  as  "Sun, 29 Feb 2004 16:21:42 -0800" or "2004-02-29 16:21:42" or
188       even "next Thursday".  A date string may contain items indicating  cal‐
189       endar  date,  time of day, time zone, day of week, relative time, rela‐
190       tive date, and numbers.  An empty string indicates the beginning of the
191       day.   The date string format is more complex than is easily documented
192       here but is fully described in the info documentation.
193

AUTHOR

195       Written by David MacKenzie.
196
198       Copyright © 2013 Free Software Foundation, Inc.   License  GPLv3+:  GNU
199       GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
200       This  is  free  software:  you  are free to change and redistribute it.
201       There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
202

SEE ALSO

204       The full documentation for date is maintained as a Texinfo manual.   If
205       the  info  and  date  programs are properly installed at your site, the
206       command
207
208              info coreutils 'date invocation'
209
210       should give you access to the complete manual.
211
212
213
214GNU coreutils 8.22               October 2018                          DATE(1)
Impressum