TIME(2)                                             Linux Programmer's Manual                                            TIME(2)



NAME
       time - get time in seconds

SYNOPSIS
       #include <time.h>

       time_t time(time_t *t);

DESCRIPTION
       time() returns the time as the number of seconds since the Epoch, 1970-01-01 00:00:00 +0000 (UTC).

       If t is non-NULL, the return value is also stored in the memory pointed to by t.

RETURN VALUE
       On  success, the value of time in seconds since the Epoch is returned.  On error, ((time_t) -1) is returned, and errno is
       set appropriately.

ERRORS
       EFAULT t points outside your accessible address space.

CONFORMING TO
       SVr4, 4.3BSD, C89, C99, POSIX.1-2001.  POSIX does not specify any error conditions.

NOTES
       POSIX.1 defines seconds since the Epoch as a value to be interpreted as the number of seconds between  a  specified  time
       and  the Epoch, according to a formula for conversion from UTC equivalent to conversion on the naive basis that leap sec-
       onds are ignored and all years divisible by 4 are leap years.  This value is not the same as the actual number of seconds
       between the time and the Epoch, because of leap seconds and because clocks are not required to be synchronized to a stan-
       dard reference.  The intention is that the interpretation of seconds since the Epoch values be  consistent;  see  POSIX.1
       Annex B 2.2.2 for further rationale.

SEE ALSO
       date(1), gettimeofday(2), ctime(3), ftime(3), time(7)

COLOPHON
       This  page  is  part of release 3.25 of the Linux man-pages project.  A description of the project, and information about
       reporting bugs, can be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.



Linux                                                      2010-02-25                                                    TIME(2)