xref: /freebsd/lib/libc/stdtime/strftime.3 (revision 4f8f43b06ed07e96a250855488cc531799d5b78f)
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32.\"     @(#)strftime.3	8.1 (Berkeley) 6/4/93
33.\"
34.Dd June 25, 2012
35.Dt STRFTIME 3
36.Os
37.Sh NAME
38.Nm strftime
39.Nd format date and time
40.Sh LIBRARY
41.Lb libc
42.Sh SYNOPSIS
43.In time.h
44.Ft size_t
45.Fo strftime
46.Fa "char * restrict buf"
47.Fa "size_t maxsize"
48.Fa "const char * restrict format"
49.Fa "const struct tm * restrict timeptr"
50.Fc
51.Ft size_t
52.Fn strftime_l "char *restrict buf" "size_t maxsize" "const char * restrict format" "const struct tm *restrict timeptr" "locale_t loc"
53.Sh DESCRIPTION
54The
55.Fn strftime
56function formats the information from
57.Fa timeptr
58into the buffer
59.Fa buf
60according to the string pointed to by
61.Fa format .
62The function
63.Fn strftime_l
64does the same as
65.Fn strftime
66but takes an explicit locale rather than using the current locale.
67.Pp
68The
69.Fa format
70string consists of zero or more conversion specifications and
71ordinary characters.
72All ordinary characters are copied directly into the buffer.
73A conversion specification consists of a percent sign
74.Dq Ql %
75and one other character.
76.Pp
77No more than
78.Fa maxsize
79characters will be placed into the array.
80If the total number of resulting characters, including the terminating
81NUL character, is not more than
82.Fa maxsize ,
83.Fn strftime
84returns the number of characters in the array, not counting the
85terminating NUL.
86Otherwise, zero is returned and the buffer contents are indeterminate.
87.Pp
88The conversion specifications are copied to the buffer after expansion
89as follows:
90.Bl -tag -width "xxxx"
91.It Cm \&%A
92is replaced by national representation of the full weekday name.
93.It Cm %a
94is replaced by national representation of
95the abbreviated weekday name.
96.It Cm \&%B
97is replaced by national representation of the full month name.
98.It Cm %b
99is replaced by national representation of
100the abbreviated month name.
101.It Cm \&%C
102is replaced by (year / 100) as decimal number; single
103digits are preceded by a zero.
104.It Cm %c
105is replaced by national representation of time and date.
106.It Cm \&%D
107is equivalent to
108.Dq Li %m/%d/%y .
109.It Cm %d
110is replaced by the day of the month as a decimal number (01-31).
111.It Cm %E* %O*
112POSIX locale extensions.
113The sequences
114%Ec %EC %Ex %EX %Ey %EY
115%Od %Oe %OH %OI %Om %OM
116%OS %Ou %OU %OV %Ow %OW %Oy
117are supposed to provide alternate
118representations.
119.Pp
120Additionally %OB implemented
121to represent alternative months names
122(used standalone, without day mentioned).
123.It Cm %e
124is replaced by the day of the month as a decimal number (1-31); single
125digits are preceded by a blank.
126.It Cm \&%F
127is equivalent to
128.Dq Li %Y-%m-%d .
129.It Cm \&%G
130is replaced by a year as a decimal number with century.
131This year is the one that contains the greater part of
132the week (Monday as the first day of the week).
133.It Cm %g
134is replaced by the same year as in
135.Dq Li %G ,
136but as a decimal number without century (00-99).
137.It Cm \&%H
138is replaced by the hour (24-hour clock) as a decimal number (00-23).
139.It Cm %h
140the same as
141.Cm %b .
142.It Cm \&%I
143is replaced by the hour (12-hour clock) as a decimal number (01-12).
144.It Cm %j
145is replaced by the day of the year as a decimal number (001-366).
146.It Cm %k
147is replaced by the hour (24-hour clock) as a decimal number (0-23);
148single digits are preceded by a blank.
149.It Cm %l
150is replaced by the hour (12-hour clock) as a decimal number (1-12);
151single digits are preceded by a blank.
152.It Cm \&%M
153is replaced by the minute as a decimal number (00-59).
154.It Cm %m
155is replaced by the month as a decimal number (01-12).
156.It Cm %n
157is replaced by a newline.
158.It Cm %O*
159the same as
160.Cm %E* .
161.It Cm %p
162is replaced by national representation of either
163"ante meridiem" (a.m.)
164or
165"post meridiem" (p.m.)
166as appropriate.
167.It Cm \&%R
168is equivalent to
169.Dq Li %H:%M .
170.It Cm %r
171is equivalent to
172.Dq Li %I:%M:%S %p .
173.It Cm \&%S
174is replaced by the second as a decimal number (00-60).
175.It Cm %s
176is replaced by the number of seconds since the Epoch, UTC (see
177.Xr mktime 3 ) .
178.It Cm \&%T
179is equivalent to
180.Dq Li %H:%M:%S .
181.It Cm %t
182is replaced by a tab.
183.It Cm \&%U
184is replaced by the week number of the year (Sunday as the first day of
185the week) as a decimal number (00-53).
186.It Cm %u
187is replaced by the weekday (Monday as the first day of the week)
188as a decimal number (1-7).
189.It Cm \&%V
190is replaced by the week number of the year (Monday as the first day of
191the week) as a decimal number (01-53).
192If the week containing January
1931 has four or more days in the new year, then it is week 1; otherwise
194it is the last week of the previous year, and the next week is week 1.
195.It Cm %v
196is equivalent to
197.Dq Li %e-%b-%Y .
198.It Cm \&%W
199is replaced by the week number of the year (Monday as the first day of
200the week) as a decimal number (00-53).
201.It Cm %w
202is replaced by the weekday (Sunday as the first day of the week)
203as a decimal number (0-6).
204.It Cm \&%X
205is replaced by national representation of the time.
206.It Cm %x
207is replaced by national representation of the date.
208.It Cm \&%Y
209is replaced by the year with century as a decimal number.
210.It Cm %y
211is replaced by the year without century as a decimal number (00-99).
212.It Cm \&%Z
213is replaced by the time zone name.
214.It Cm %z
215is replaced by the time zone offset from UTC; a leading plus sign stands for
216east of UTC, a minus sign for west of UTC, hours and minutes follow
217with two digits each and no delimiter between them (common form for
218RFC 822 date headers).
219.It Cm %+
220is replaced by national representation of the date and time
221(the format is similar to that produced by
222.Xr date 1 ) .
223.It Cm %-*
224GNU libc extension.
225Do not do any padding when performing numerical outputs.
226.It Cm %_*
227GNU libc extension.
228Explicitly specify space for padding.
229.It Cm %0*
230GNU libc extension.
231Explicitly specify zero for padding.
232.It Cm %%
233is replaced by
234.Ql % .
235.El
236.Sh SEE ALSO
237.Xr date 1 ,
238.Xr printf 1 ,
239.Xr ctime 3 ,
240.Xr printf 3 ,
241.Xr strptime 3 ,
242.Xr wcsftime 3
243.Sh STANDARDS
244The
245.Fn strftime
246function
247conforms to
248.St -isoC
249with a lot of extensions including
250.Ql \&%C ,
251.Ql \&%D ,
252.Ql %E* ,
253.Ql %e ,
254.Ql %G ,
255.Ql %g ,
256.Ql %h ,
257.Ql %k ,
258.Ql %l ,
259.Ql %n ,
260.Ql %O* ,
261.Ql \&%R ,
262.Ql %r ,
263.Ql %s ,
264.Ql \&%T ,
265.Ql %t ,
266.Ql %u ,
267.Ql \&%V ,
268.Ql %z ,
269.Ql %+ .
270.Pp
271The peculiar week number and year in the replacements of
272.Ql %G ,
273.Ql %g
274and
275.Ql \&%V
276are defined in
277.St -iso8601 .
278The
279.Fn strftime_l
280function conforms to
281.St -p1003.1-2008 .
282.Sh BUGS
283There is no conversion specification for the phase of the moon.
284.Pp
285The
286.Fn strftime
287function does not correctly handle multibyte characters in the
288.Fa format
289argument.
290