Terminal touch -t

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Level 1

94 points

Terminal touch -t

In Sierra I used the terminal touch -t command. It changed the modified date but not the created date. How do I do the latter.

Thanks,

Posted on Apr 11, 2017 3:55 AM

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Answer 1

oxcart Author

Level 1

94 points

Apr 11, 2017 11:05 AM in response to Barney-15E

Hi Barney,

I did not see any reference to -d date on the link you sent.

However, I spent a bit more time on the link and worked it out. The problem is that different commands require different formats for the date. Go figure?

SetFile -d "09/21/2016 11:11:11" <file path>

changes the creation date

touch -t 201609211111 <file path>

changes the modified date, but note that there are no seconds specified in this time convention

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Answer 2

oxcart Author

Level 1

94 points

Apr 11, 2017 5:11 AM in response to Barney-15E

Thanks for the info. Now, using SetFile -d command I am getting the error "invalid date/time".

I have tried the usual string or numbers eg. YYYYMMDDhhmmss

and also %2017%04%04%11%11%11

What should I try next?

Thanks

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Answer 3

Barney-15E

Level 10

123,116 points

Apr 11, 2017 5:28 AM in response to oxcart

Did you try using the example given in the link?

I have no idea how to use SetFile.

Here is an excerpt from the man page:

-d date Sets the creation date, where date is a string of the form:

"mm/dd/[yy]yy [hh:mm:[:ss] [AM | PM]]" Notes: Enclose the

string in quotation marks if it contains spaces. The date

must be in the Unix epoch, that is, between 1/1/1970 and

1/18/2038. If the year is provided as a two-digit year, it is

assumed to be in the 21st century and must be from 00 (2000)

through 38 (2038).