xref: /freebsd/usr.bin/time/time.1 (revision ea906c4152774dff300bb26fbfc1e4188351c89a)
1.\" Copyright (c) 1980, 1991, 1993
2.\"	The Regents of the University of California.  All rights reserved.
3.\"
4.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
5.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
6.\" are met:
7.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
8.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
9.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
10.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
11.\"    documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
12.\" 3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software
13.\"    must display the following acknowledgement:
14.\"	This product includes software developed by the University of
15.\"	California, Berkeley and its contributors.
16.\" 4. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors
17.\"    may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
18.\"    without specific prior written permission.
19.\"
20.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
21.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
22.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
23.\" ARE DISCLAIMED.  IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
24.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
25.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS
26.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
27.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT
28.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY
29.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF
30.\" SUCH DAMAGE.
31.\"
32.\"     @(#)time.1	8.1 (Berkeley) 6/6/93
33.\" $FreeBSD$
34.\"
35.Dd May 14, 2006
36.Dt TIME 1
37.Os
38.Sh NAME
39.Nm time
40.Nd time command execution
41.Sh SYNOPSIS
42.Nm
43.Op Fl al
44.Op Fl h | Fl p
45.Op Fl o Ar file
46.Ar utility Op Ar argument ...
47.Sh DESCRIPTION
48The
49.Nm
50utility
51executes and
52times the specified
53.Ar utility .
54After the
55.Ar utility
56finishes,
57.Nm
58writes to the standard error stream,
59(in seconds):
60the total time elapsed,
61the time used to execute the
62.Ar utility
63process and the time consumed by system overhead.
64.Pp
65The following options are available:
66.Bl -tag -width indent
67.It Fl a
68If the
69.Fl o
70flag is used, append to the specified file rather than overwriting
71it.
72Otherwise, this option has no effect.
73.It Fl h
74Print times in a human friendly format.
75Times are printed in minutes, hours,
76etc.\& as appropriate.
77.It Fl l
78The contents of the
79.Em rusage
80structure are printed as well.
81.It Fl o Ar file
82Write the output to
83.Ar file
84instead of stderr.
85If
86.Ar file
87exists and the
88.Fl a
89flag is not specified, the file will be overwritten.
90.It Fl p
91Makes
92.Nm
93output POSIX.2 compliant (each time is printed on its own line).
94.El
95.Pp
96Some shells may provide a builtin
97.Nm
98command which is similar or identical to this utility.
99Consult the
100.Xr builtin 1
101manual page.
102.Pp
103If
104.Nm
105receives a
106.Dv SIGINFO
107(see the status argument for
108.Xr stty 1 )
109signal, the current time the given command is running will be written to the
110standard output.
111.Sh ENVIRONMENT
112The
113.Ev PATH
114environment variable is used to locate the requested
115.Ar utility
116if the name contains no
117.Ql /
118characters.
119.Sh EXIT STATUS
120If
121.Ar utility
122could be timed successfully, its exit status is returned.
123If
124.Ar utility
125terminated abnormally, a warning message is output to stderr.
126If the
127.Ar utility
128was found but could not be run, the exit status is 126.
129If no
130.Ar utility
131could be found at all, the exit status is 127.
132If
133.Nm
134encounters any other error, the exit status is between 1 and 125
135included.
136.Sh SEE ALSO
137.Xr builtin 1 ,
138.Xr csh 1 ,
139.Xr getrusage 2 ,
140.Xr wait 2
141.Sh STANDARDS
142The
143.Nm
144utility is expected to conform to ISO/IEC 9945-2:1993 (``POSIX'').
145.Sh HISTORY
146A
147.Nm
148utility appeared in
149.At v3 .
150