gettimeofday

SYNOPSIS
       #include <sys/time.h>

       int gettimeofday(struct timeval *tv, struct timezone *tz);
       int settimeofday(const struct timeval *tv, const struct timezone *tz);

   Feature Test Macro Requirements for glibc (see feature_test_macros(7)):

       settimeofday(): _BSD_SOURCE

DESCRIPTION
       The  functions  gettimeofday()  and  settimeofday() can get and set the
       time as well as a timezone.  The tv argument is a  struct  timeval  (as
       specified in <sys/time.h>):

           struct timeval {
               time_t      tv_sec;     /* seconds */
               suseconds_t tv_usec;    /* microseconds */
           };

       and  gives  the number of seconds and microseconds since the Epoch (see
       time(2)).  The tz argument is a struct timezone:

           struct timezone {
               int tz_minuteswest;     /* minutes west of Greenwich */
               int tz_dsttime;         /* type of DST correction */
           };

       If either tv or tz is NULL, the corresponding structure is not  set  or
       returned.

       The  use  of the timezone structure is obsolete; the tz argument should
       normally be specified as NULL.  The tz_dsttime  field  has  never  been
       used  under Linux; it has not been and will not be supported by libc or
       glibc.  Each and every occurrence of this field in  the  kernel  source
       (other  than  the declaration) is a bug.  Thus, the following is purely
       of historic interest.

       The field tz_dsttime contains a symbolic  constant  (values  are  given
       below) that indicates in which part of the year Daylight Saving Time is
       in force.  (Note: its value is constant throughout the  year:  it  does
       not  indicate that DST is in force, it just selects an algorithm.)  The
       daylight saving time algorithms defined are as follows :

           DST_NONE     /* not on dst */
           DST_USA      /* USA style dst */
           DST_AUST     /* Australian style dst */
           DST_WET      /* Western European dst */
           DST_MET      /* Middle European dst */
           DST_EET      /* Eastern European dst */
           DST_CAN      /* Canada */
           DST_GB       /* Great Britain and Eire */
           DST_RUM      /* Rumania */

       the  tz_minuteswest  field  is  non-zero.  In such a case it is assumed
       that the CMOS clock is on local time, and that it has to be incremented
       by  this  amount  to get UTC system time.  No doubt it is a bad idea to
       use this feature.

       Macros for operating on timeval  structures  are  described  in  timer-
       add(3).

RETURN VALUE
       gettimeofday() and settimeofday() return 0 for success, or -1 for fail-
       ure (in which case errno is set appropriately).

ERRORS
       EFAULT One of tv or tz pointed outside the accessible address space.

       EINVAL Timezone (or something else) is invalid.

       EPERM  The calling process has insufficient privilege to call  settime-
              ofday(); under Linux the CAP_SYS_TIME capability is required.

CONFORMING TO
       SVr4, 4.3BSD.  POSIX.1-2001 describes gettimeofday() but not settimeof-
       day().  POSIX.1-2008 marks gettimeofday() as obsolete, recomending  the
       use of clock_gettime(2) instead.

NOTES
       Traditionally, the fields of struct timeval were of type long.

SEE ALSO
       date(1),  adjtimex(2),  time(2),  ctime(3),  ftime(3), capabilities(7),
       time(7)

COLOPHON
       This page is part of release 3.23 of the Linux  man-pages  project.   A
       description  of  the project, and information about reporting bugs, can
       be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.



Linux                             2009-03-25                   GETTIMEOFDAY(2)