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From: lanzo@wgate.UUCP (Mark Lanzo)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: how to compare file modification time in bourne shell script
Message-ID: <105@atesysv.UUCP>
Date: 26 Jul 90 13:03:13 GMT
References: <1990Jul23.233044.2729@silma.com> <840@ehviea.ine.philips.nl>
Reply-To: lanzo@atesysv.UUCP (Mark Lanzo)
Organization: Wandel & Goltermann Technologies, RTP, NC
Lines: 35

Someone asks:
>
> I need to compare the modification times of two files in a bourne shell
> script. I would like to do this without writing C code.
> Machine is Sparcstation 1 running SunOS 4.03c

> Thus I need a function:
> 
> newer file1 file2
> 
> that returns 0 if file1 is newer than file2 else returns 1
> 

Try this:

#!/bin/sh

newer()
    {
    f1="$1"
    set -- `ls -ct -- "$f1" "$2"`
    test "$1" = "$f1"
    return $?			# This line isn't really necessary
    }

as written, this function presupposes that $1 and $2 refer to accessible
files (else the ls command will pop up with a "not found" type of error).



-- 
Mark Lanzo                      Wandel & Goltermann Technologies, Inc.
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