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mtime vs ctime

 
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Old 10-29-2004
ctime refers to changes made to the file's inode (such as changing permissions, etc). mtime refers to changes to the data within the file. So cnewer will use a reference files inode change time for the comparision, whereas newer will use a reference files data modification time.

Some manual pages are very vague and don't make a clear distinction, so your confusion is understandable!

FYI, there's also atime, which refers to file access time. Also, there is, unfortunately (and to the best of my knowledge), no way of finding file creation time through an inode.

Cheers
ZB
 
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LEARN ABOUT DEBIAN

function::ctime

function::ctime

FUNCTION:(3stap)					      Time utility functions						  FUNCTION:(3stap)

NAME

       function::ctime - Convert seconds since epoch into human readable date/time string

SYNOPSIS

	   ctime:string(epochsecs:long)

ARGUMENTS

       epochsecs
	   Number of seconds since epoch (as returned by gettimeofday_s)

DESCRIPTION

       Takes an argument of seconds since the epoch as returned by gettimeofday_s. Returns a string of the form

       "Wed Jun 30 21:49:08 1993"

       The string will always be exactly 24 characters. If the time would be unreasonable far in the past (before what can be represented with a
       32 bit offset in seconds from the epoch) the returned string will be "a long, long time ago...". If the time would be unreasonable far in
       the future the returned string will be "far far in the future..."  (both these strings are also 24 characters wide).

       Note that the epoch (zero) corresponds to

       "Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970"

       The earliest full date given by ctime, corresponding to epochsecs -2147483648 is "Fri Dec 13 20:45:52 1901". The latest full date given by
       ctime, corresponding to epochsecs 2147483647 is "Tue Jan 19 03:14:07 2038".

       The abbreviations for the days of the week are 'Sun', 'Mon', 'Tue', 'Wed', 'Thu', 'Fri', and 'Sat'. The abbreviations for the months are
       'Jan', 'Feb', 'Mar', 'Apr', 'May', 'Jun', 'Jul', 'Aug', 'Sep', 'Oct', 'Nov', and 'Dec'.

       Note that the real C library ctime function puts a newline ('
') character at the end of the string that this function does not. Also note
       that since the kernel has no concept of timezones, the returned time is always in GMT.

SystemTap Tapset Reference					     May 2013							  FUNCTION:(3stap)