utime()

record the modification time for a file or directory

Synopsis:

#include <sys/types.h>
#include <utime.h>
int utime( const char *path,
           const struct utimbuf *times );

struct utimbuf {
    time_t   actime;    /* access time */
    time_t   modtime;   /* modification time */
};

Description:

The utime() function records the access and modification times for the file or directory identified by path.

If the times argument is NULL, the access and modification times of the file or directory are set to the current time. The effective user ID of the process must match the owner of the file or directory, or the process must have write permission to the file or directory, or appropriate privileges in order to use the utime() function in this way.

If the times argument isn't NULL, it's interpreted as a pointer to a utimbuf structure, and the access and modification times of the file or directory are set to the values contained in the designated structure. Only the owner of the file or directory, and processes with appropriate privileges are permitted to use the utime() function in this way. The access and modification times are taken from the actime and modtime fields in this structure.

Returns:

0

Success

-1

An error occurred. errno is set to indicate the error.

Errors:

EACCES

Search permission is denied for a component of path, or the times argument is NULL, and the effective user ID of the process doesn't match the owner of the file, and write access is denied.

ENAMETOOLONG

The argument path exceeds PATH_MAX in length, or a pathname component is longer than NAME_MAX.

ENOENT

The specified path doesn't exist, or path is an empty string.

ENOTDIR

A component of path isn't a directory.

EPERM

The times argument isn't NULL, and the calling process's effective user ID has write access to the file but doesn't match the owner of the file, and the calling process doesn't have the appropriate privileges.

EROFS

The named file resides on a read-only file system.

Examples:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <utime.h>

void main( int argc, char *argv[] )
  {
    if( (utime( argv[1], NULL ) != 0) && (argc > 1) ) {
       printf( "Unable to set time for %s\n", argv[1] );
    }
  }

Classification:

POSIX 1003.1

See also:

errno