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

DATE STRING

157       The --date=STRING is a mostly free format human  readable  date  string
158       such  as  "Sun, 29 Feb 2004 16:21:42 -0800" or "2004-02-29 16:21:42" or
159       even "next Thursday".  A date string may contain items indicating  cal‐
160       endar  date,  time of day, time zone, day of week, relative time, rela‐
161       tive date, and numbers.  An empty string indicates the beginning of the
162       day.   The date string format is more complex than is easily documented
163       here but is fully described in the info documentation.
164

ENVIRONMENT

166       TZ     Specifies the timezone, unless overridden by command line param‐
167              eters.  If neither is specified, the setting from /etc/localtime
168              is used.
169

AUTHOR

171       Written by David MacKenzie.
172

REPORTING BUGS

174       Report date bugs to bug-coreutils@gnu.org
175       GNU coreutils home page: <http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
176       General help using GNU software: <http://www.gnu.org/gethelp/>
177       Report date translation bugs to <http://translationproject.org/team/>
178
180       Copyright © 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.   License  GPLv3+:  GNU
181       GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
182       This  is  free  software:  you  are free to change and redistribute it.
183       There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
184

SEE ALSO

186       The full documentation for date is maintained as a Texinfo manual.   If
187       the  info  and  date  programs are properly installed at your site, the
188       command
189
190              info coreutils 'date invocation'
191
192       should give you access to the complete manual.
193
194
195
196GNU coreutils 8.5                November 2010                         DATE(1)
Impressum