strftime(4)


strftime -- language-specific strings for dates and times

Description

There can exist one printable file per locale to specify its date and time formatting information. These files must be kept in the directory /usr/lib/locale/locale/LC_TIME. The contents of these files are:

1.
optional abbreviated month names (in order)

2.
optional month names (in order)

3.
optional abbreviated weekday names (in order)

4.
optional weekday names (in order)

5.
optional default strings that specify formats for locale time (%X) and locale date (%x)

6.
optional default format for cftime, if the argument for cftime is a null

7.
optional ante meridian string

8.
optional post meridian string

9.
optional default format for date command output

10.
optional default format for local time for 12 hour clock (AM/PM form)

11.
optional separator

12.
optional alternate digit and era information for the locale

For 1-11 above, each string is on a line by itself. All white space is significant. The order of the strings in the above list is the same order in which they must appear in the file. If item 12 is present and any of 1-10 are not specified, item 11 must be present. The separator is a lone % character.

Alternate digit and era information may be omitted. If present, the amount of information is variable, and fields are delimited by use of the following keywords. They can be specified in any order.


alt_digits
semicolon separated strings, each surrounded by double-quotes. The first string is the alternate symbol for zero, the second is the alternate for one, and so on up to a maximum of 100. Less than 100 alternate digit symbols may be specified. Lines may be continued using the backlash (\) character.

era_d_fmt
definition of the date format in the alternate era notation. This is a single string surrounded by double-quotes.

era_t_fmt
definition of the time format in the alternate era notation. This is a single string surrounded by double-quotes.

era_d_t_fmt
definition of the date and time format in the alternate era notation. This is a single string surrounded by double-quotes.

era
semicolon separated strings, each surrounded by double-quotes. Within each string is an era description segment which has the following format:
   	dir:offset:start_date:end_date:era_name:era_format

dir
a + or - character. + denotes that years closer to the start_date have lower numbers than those closer to the end_date. - denotes that years closer to the start_date have higher numbers than those closer to the end_date.

offset
the year number closest to the start_date in the era.

start_date
the date for the start of the era, in the form yyyy/mm/dd, where yyyy is the year, mm is the month, and dd is the day. Years prior to AD 1 are represented as negative.

end_date
the date for the end of the era. This has the same format as start_date except the two special values -* and +*, denote that the end date is the beginning of time, and the end of time, respectively.

era_name
a string for the name of the era

era_format
a string for formatting the year in the era

Multiple era segments may be specified. Additional segments may be added using the backlash (\) character as a continuation character for the era.

Example

Here are the contents of /usr/lib/locale/C/LC_TIME:
   Jan
   Feb
   ...
   January
   February
   ...
   Sun
   Mon
   ...
   Sunday
   Monday
   ...
   %H:%M:%S
   %m/%d/%y
   %a %b %d %T %Z %Y
   AM
   PM
   %a %b %d %T %Z %Y
   %I:%M:%S %p

Alternate digit and era information may be defined as follows:

   alt_digits "0th";"1st";"2nd";"3rd";"4th";"5th";"6th";"7th";\
       "8th";"9th";"10th";"11th";"12th";"13th";"14th";"15th"
   era_d_fmt "The alternative date format is %Y (%a) in %EC"
   era_t_fmt "The alternative time format is %h (%S) in %EC"
   era_d_t_fmt "The alternative date and time is %Y %H :%M:%S (%a) in %EC"
   era "+:0:1992/10/22:+*:XPG4-Era:The Year of %EC";\
       "+:1:1989/01/01:1992/10/21:XPG3-Era:The Year of %EC";\
       "+:0:0000/01/01:1988/12/31:Pre-XPG:The Year of %EC";\
       "+:1:-0001/12/31:-*:BC:%Ey %EC"

Files

/usr/lib/locale/locale/LC_TIME

References

ctime(3C), date(1), setlocale(3C), strftime(3C), strptime(3C)
© 2004 The SCO Group, Inc. All rights reserved.
UnixWare 7 Release 7.1.4 - 25 April 2004