Exploring Date Commands in Linux

In this article, we will see various options available in the "date" command.

So let's begin.

date

date command shows the current date and time.

date -u

date -u command shows the current date and time.

date --date="string"

This command shows the date as per the string passed in it. It can be used to display previous dates or date on a particular day.

date -r <filename> or date --reference=<filename>

This command show the last modification time and date of any file.

date "+%a"

This command shows the current day name in abbreviation. These commands are generally known as date formats. Other than %a there are many options available like this, e.g. - %m, %M, %y, %B, etc.

All these options have different uses. You can go to the manual page by typing "man date" of date command and check their usage. You can also use multiple date formatters at the same time to display the date and time as you want.

So, friends, that's all here.

Hope You like it and found it useful :)