
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.1//EN"
        "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml11/DTD/xhtml11.dtd"><script async src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script>
<!-- MyFirstUnitAd -->
<ins class="adsbygoogle"
     style="display:inline-block;width:970px;height:250px"
     data-ad-client="ca-pub-5778386704669218"
     data-ad-slot="1503492166"></ins>
<script>
(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});
</script>

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
    <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="../../../style.css" title="style" />
    <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="../style.css" title="style" />
    <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" />

    <title>ctime.3p - Linux manual page</title>
</head>

<body>

<div class="page-top"><a id="top_of_page"></a></div>
<!--%%%TOP_BAR%%%-->
    <div class="nav-bar">
        <table class="nav-table">
            <tr>
                <td class="nav-cell">
                    <p class="nav-text">
                        <a href="http://man7.org/index.html">man7.org</a> &gt; Linux &gt; <a href="../index.html">man-pages</a>
                    </p>
                </td>
                <td class="training-cell">
                    <p class="training-text"><a class="training-link" href="http://man7.org/training/">Linux/UNIX system programming training</a></p>
                </td>
            </tr>
        </table>
    </div>

<hr class="nav-end" />

<!--%%%PAGE_START%%%-->


<table class="sec-table">
<tr>
    <td>
        <p class="section-dir">
<a href="ctime_r.3p.html#PROLOG">PROLOG</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#NAME">NAME</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#SYNOPSIS">SYNOPSIS</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#DESCRIPTION">DESCRIPTION</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#RETURN_VALUE">RETURN&nbsp;VALUE</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#ERRORS">ERRORS</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#EXAMPLES">EXAMPLES</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#APPLICATION_USAGE">APPLICATION&nbsp;USAGE</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#RATIONALE">RATIONALE</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#FUTURE_DIRECTIONS">FUTURE&nbsp;DIRECTIONS</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#SEE_ALSO">SEE&nbsp;ALSO</a> | <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#COPYRIGHT">COPYRIGHT</a>
        </p>
    </td>
    <td class="search-box">
        <div class="man-search-box">

            <form method="get" action="http://www.google.com/search">
                <fieldset class="man-search">
                    <input type="text" name="q" size="10" maxlength="255" value="" />
                    <input type="hidden" name="sitesearch" value="man7.org/linux/man-pages" />
                    <input type="submit" name="sa" value="Search online pages" />
                </fieldset>
            </form>

        </div>
    </td>
    <td> </td>
</tr>
</table>

<pre>
<span class="headline">CTIME(3P)                 POSIX Programmer's Manual                CTIME(3P)</span>
</pre>
<h2><a id="PROLOG" href="ctime_r.3p.html#PROLOG"></a>PROLOG  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       This manual page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual.  The Linux
       implementation of this interface may differ (consult the
       corresponding Linux manual page for details of Linux behavior), or
       the interface may not be implemented on Linux.
</pre>
<h2><a id="NAME" href="ctime_r.3p.html#NAME"></a>NAME  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       ctime, ctime_r — convert a time value to a date and time string
</pre>
<h2><a id="SYNOPSIS" href="ctime_r.3p.html#SYNOPSIS"></a>SYNOPSIS  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       #include &lt;time.h&gt;

       char *ctime(const time_t *<i>clock</i>);
       char *ctime_r(const time_t *<i>clock</i>, char *<i>buf</i>);
</pre>
<h2><a id="DESCRIPTION" href="ctime_r.3p.html#DESCRIPTION"></a>DESCRIPTION  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       For <i>ctime</i>(): The functionality described on this reference page is
       aligned with the ISO C standard. Any conflict between the
       requirements described here and the ISO C standard is unintentional.
       This volume of POSIX.1‐2008 defers to the ISO C standard.

       The <i>ctime</i>() function shall convert the time pointed to by <i>clock</i>,
       representing time in seconds since the Epoch, to local time in the
       form of a string. It shall be equivalent to:

           <b>asctime(localtime(clock))</b>

       The <i>asctime</i>(), <i>ctime</i>(), <i>gmtime</i>(), and <i>localtime</i>() functions shall
       return values in one of two static objects: a broken-down time
       structure and an array of <b>char</b>.  Execution of any of the functions
       may overwrite the information returned in either of these objects by
       any of the other functions.

       The <i>ctime</i>() function need not be thread-safe.

       The <i>ctime_r</i>() function shall convert the calendar time pointed to by
       <i>clock</i> to local time in exactly the same form as <i>ctime</i>() and put the
       string into the array pointed to by <i>buf</i> (which shall be at least 26
       bytes in size) and return <i>buf</i>.

       Unlike <i>ctime</i>(), the <i>ctime_r</i>() function is not required to set <i>tzname</i>.
       If <i>ctime_r</i>() does not set <i>tzname</i>, it shall not set <i>daylight</i> and shall
       not set <i>timezone</i>.
</pre>
<h2><a id="RETURN_VALUE" href="ctime_r.3p.html#RETURN_VALUE"></a>RETURN VALUE  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       The <i>ctime</i>() function shall return the pointer returned by <i>asctime</i>()
       with that broken-down time as an argument.

       Upon successful completion, <i>ctime_r</i>() shall return a pointer to the
       string pointed to by <i>buf</i>.  When an error is encountered, a null
       pointer shall be returned.
</pre>
<h2><a id="ERRORS" href="ctime_r.3p.html#ERRORS"></a>ERRORS  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       No errors are defined.

       <i>The following sections are informative.</i>
</pre>
<h2><a id="EXAMPLES" href="ctime_r.3p.html#EXAMPLES"></a>EXAMPLES  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       None.
</pre>
<h2><a id="APPLICATION_USAGE" href="ctime_r.3p.html#APPLICATION_USAGE"></a>APPLICATION USAGE  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       These functions are included only for compatibility with older
       implementations. They have undefined behavior if the resulting string
       would be too long, so the use of these functions should be
       discouraged.  On implementations that do not detect output string
       length overflow, it is possible to overflow the output buffers in
       such a way as to cause applications to fail, or possible system
       security violations. Also, these functions do not support localized
       date and time formats. To avoid these problems, applications should
       use <i>strftime</i>() to generate strings from broken-down times.

       Values for the broken-down time structure can be obtained by calling
       <i>gmtime</i>() or <i>localtime</i>().

       The <i>ctime_r</i>() function is thread-safe and shall return values in a
       user-supplied buffer instead of possibly using a static data area
       that may be overwritten by each call.

       Attempts to use <i>ctime</i>() or <i>ctime_r</i>() for times before the Epoch or
       for times beyond the year 9999 produce undefined results. Refer to
       <a href="asctime.3p.html">asctime(3p)</a>.
</pre>
<h2><a id="RATIONALE" href="ctime_r.3p.html#RATIONALE"></a>RATIONALE  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       The standard developers decided to mark the <i>ctime</i>() and <i>ctime_r</i>()
       functions obsolescent even though they are in the ISO C standard due
       to the possibility of buffer overflow. The ISO C standard also
       provides the <i>strftime</i>() function which can be used to avoid these
       problems.
</pre>
<h2><a id="FUTURE_DIRECTIONS" href="ctime_r.3p.html#FUTURE_DIRECTIONS"></a>FUTURE DIRECTIONS  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       These functions may be removed in a future version.
</pre>
<h2><a id="SEE_ALSO" href="ctime_r.3p.html#SEE_ALSO"></a>SEE ALSO  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       <a href="asctime.3p.html">asctime(3p)</a>, <a href="clock.3p.html">clock(3p)</a>, <a href="difftime.3p.html">difftime(3p)</a>, <a href="gmtime.3p.html">gmtime(3p)</a>, <a href="localtime.3p.html">localtime(3p)</a>,
       <a href="mktime.3p.html">mktime(3p)</a>, <a href="strftime.3p.html">strftime(3p)</a>, <a href="strptime.3p.html">strptime(3p)</a>, <a href="time.3p.html">time(3p)</a>, <a href="utime.3p.html">utime(3p)</a>

       The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2008, <a href="../man0/time.h.0p.html">time.h(0p)</a>
</pre>
<h2><a id="COPYRIGHT" href="ctime_r.3p.html#COPYRIGHT"></a>COPYRIGHT  &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="ctime_r.3p.html#top_of_page"><span class="top-link">top</span></a></h2><pre>
       Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form
       from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2013 Edition, Standard for Information
       Technology -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX), The Open
       Group Base Specifications Issue 7, Copyright (C) 2013 by the
       Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open
       Group.  (This is POSIX.1-2008 with the 2013 Technical Corrigendum 1
       applied.) In the event of any discrepancy between this version and
       the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and
       The Open Group Standard is the referee document. The original
       Standard can be obtained online at <a href="http://www.unix.org/online.html">http://www.unix.org/online.html</a> .

       Any typographical or formatting errors that appear in this page are
       most likely to have been introduced during the conversion of the
       source files to man page format. To report such errors, see
       <a href="https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html">https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html</a> .

<span class="footline">IEEE/The Open Group                 2013                           CTIME(3P)</span>
</pre>

<hr class="end-man-text" />
<p>Pages that refer to this page: 
    <a href="../man0/time.h.0p.html">time.h(0p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="asctime.3p.html">asctime(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="clock.3p.html">clock(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="clock_getres.3p.html">clock_getres(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="difftime.3p.html">difftime(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="getdate.3p.html">getdate(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="gettimeofday.3p.html">gettimeofday(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="gmtime.3p.html">gmtime(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="localtime.3p.html">localtime(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="mktime.3p.html">mktime(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="strftime.3p.html">strftime(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="time.3p.html">time(3p)</a>,&nbsp; 
    <a href="tzset.3p.html">tzset(3p)</a>
</p>
<hr/>

 
<hr class="start-footer" />

<div class="footer"> 

<table class="colophon-table">
    <tr>
    <td class="pub-info">
        <p>
            HTML rendering created 2018-02-02
            by <a href="http://man7.org/mtk/index.html">Michael Kerrisk</a>, 
            author of 
            <a href="http://man7.org/tlpi/"><em>The Linux Programming Interface</em></a>, 
            maintainer of the 
            <a href="https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/">Linux <em>man-pages</em> project</a>.
        </p>
        <p>
            For details of in-depth
            <strong>Linux/UNIX system programming training courses</strong>
            that I teach, look <a href="http://man7.org/training/">here</a>.
        </p>
        <p>
            Hosting by <a href="http://www.jambit.com/index_en.html">jambit GmbH</a>.
        </p>
        <p>
            <a href="http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=referer">
            <img src="http://www.w3.org/Icons/valid-xhtml11"
                alt="Valid XHTML 1.1" height="31" width="88" />
            </a>
        </p>
    </td>
    <td class="colophon-divider">
    </td>
    <td class="tlpi-cover">
        <a href="http://man7.org/tlpi/"><img src="../../../tlpi/cover/TLPI-front-cover-vsmall.png" alt="Cover of TLPI" /></a>
    </td>
    </tr>
</table>

</div>

<hr class="end-footer" />



<!--BEGIN-SITETRACKING-->
<!-- SITETRACKING.man7.org_linux_man-pages -->

<!-- Start of StatCounter Code (xhtml) -->

<script type="text/javascript">
//<![CDATA[
var sc_project=7422636; 
var sc_invisible=1; 
var sc_security="9b6714ff"; 
//]]>
</script>
<script type="text/javascript"
src="http://www.statcounter.com/counter/counter_xhtml.js"></script>
<noscript><div class="statcounter"><a title="website
statistics" href="http://statcounter.com/"
class="statcounter"><img class="statcounter"
src="http://c.statcounter.com/7422636/0/9b6714ff/1/"
alt="website statistics" /></a></div></noscript>

<!-- End of StatCounter Code -->


<!-- Start of Google Analytics Code -->

<script type="text/javascript">

  var _gaq = _gaq || [];
  _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-9830363-8']);
  _gaq.push(['_trackPageview']);

  (function() {
    var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true;
    ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js';
    var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s);
  })();

</script>

<!-- End of Google Analytics Code -->

<!--END-SITETRACKING-->

</body>
</html>
