[Q] busybox and touch command - Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Who can help me with the syntax of the command touch?
Using the touch command as follows:
touch -d "01/01/2012 00:00:00" \ data \ data \ com.android.providers.telephony \ databases \ mmssms.db
the system outputs the following message:
unknow option - d etc ...
But Usage Command is:
touch [-c] [-d DATE] FILE [FILE]
BR
die-hard

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Yeah, that's weird. It works as you typed it in a regular linux shell, but the busybox on my android gives me the same error. Might be a bug in busybox, or perhaps the date parser in the busybox version is less tolerant on the date format. It may be a config option as well. I know that date/time parsing is very "expensive" in libc and perhaps busybox just doesn't implement it by default.

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10x bro,
I solved installing busybox 1.18.0 git

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My busybox touch accepts dates in ISO format:
/ # touch -d '2011-1-1 23:1' x
/ # ls -l x
-rw-rw-rw- root shell 0 2011-01-02 00:01 x
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

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Hi
I have CM 10.1 with busybox 1.20.2-jb installed. Touch binary doenst have -d option:
Code:
1|[email protected]:/sdcard $ touch --h
touch --h
touch: usage: touch [-alm] [-t time_t] <file>
-t option only accept date in unix timestamp format, but default format ( [[[[cc]yy]MM]dd]hhmm[.ss] ) needed for me.
Can anybody provide touch binary with -d option support or with -t option, that accept date in this format: [[[[cc]yy]MM]dd]hhmm[.ss]?
Second question:
Code:
[email protected]:/ $ awk 'BEGIN {print mktime("1970-01-01 00 00 00")}' <
-5454000
Why awk return -5454000 instead 0?
I tried update busybox to 1.21.0 version, it doesnt help.

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memtew said:
Hi
I have CM 10.1 with busybox 1.20.2-jb installed. Touch binary doenst have -d option:
Code:
1|[email protected]:/sdcard $ touch --h
touch --h
touch: usage: touch [-alm] [-t time_t] <file>
-t option only accept date in unix timestamp format, but default format ( [[[[cc]yy]MM]dd]hhmm[.ss] ) needed for me.
Can anybody provide touch binary with -d option support or with -t option, that accept date in this format: [[[[cc]yy]MM]dd]hhmm[.ss]?
Second question:
Code:
[email protected]:/ $ awk 'BEGIN {print mktime("1970-01-01 00 00 00")}' <
-5454000
Why awk return -5454000 instead 0?
I tried update busybox to 1.21.0 version, it doesnt help.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Use the touch inside busybox, not the one that comes with the stock rom. Install Busybox from Stericson on your android device. It has also the -d option. You must run it as root, so check that you are superuser if using a script.
Code:
su
busybox touch -c -t YYYYMMDDHHMM[.ss] yourfile

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hi,
i have the command working, but is it possible to keep the date and time of each file like "vid_yyyymmdd_hhmmss.mp4" to push it in the command for each file of the folder ?
Thanks.

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nobody to help ???

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diabolyk said:
hi,
i have the command working, but is it possible to keep the date and time of each file like "vid_yyyymmdd_hhmmss.mp4" to push it in the command for each file of the folder ?
Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You want to rename the files?

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scandiun said:
You want to rename the files?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
no, just change the time of creation of the file

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diabolyk34 said:
no, just change the time of creation of the file
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Don't understand exactly what you want to do.

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scandiun said:
Don't understand exactly what you want to do.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have found a command that working well but I should change the files one by one and I would like to find a command which is changing all videos files of a folder.
video name for example : vid_20170717_103251.mp4
need to extract date and time (in the name of the file) to put it in the command.
here the command which is working :
busybox touch -c -t 201707171032 *
and it changes all the files of the folder with the *...
I would like to extract the elements of the name from each file to give it its own date and time.

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diabolyk34 said:
I have found a command that working well but I should change the files one by one and I would like to find a command which is changing all videos files of a folder.
video name for example : vid_20170717_103251.mp4
need to extract date and time (in the name of the file) to put it in the command.
here the command which is working :
busybox touch -c -t 201707171032 *
and it changes all the files of the folder with the *...
I would like to extract the elements of the name from each file to give it its own date and time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ok to do that you need a shell (bash) script. For example this code will get the date in the format you want, now you just need to read it from files and change the timestamp accordingly.
Code:
echo vid_20110717_103251.mp4 | sed 's/vid_*//' | sed 's;.mp4*;;' | sed 's/_//'
Test it online here: http://www.learnshell.org/

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scandiun said:
Ok to do that you need a shell (bash) script. For example this code will get the date in the format you want, now you just need to read it from files and change the timestamp accordingly.
Code:
echo vid_20110717_103251.mp4 | sed 's/vid_*//' | sed 's;.mp4*;;' | sed 's/_//'
Test it online here: http://www.learnshell.org/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ok thanks for your help, your code is well working
Is it possible to keep all without the seconds (last 2 digits before .mp4) ?
And after that it should put the result in the command 'busybox touch -c -t result name_of_the_file'
and how to repeat that for each file named 'vid_xxxx' ?
thanks a lot

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diabolyk34 said:
ok thanks for your help, your code is well working
Is it possible to keep all without the seconds (last 2 digits before .mp4) ?
And after that it should put the result in the command 'busybox touch -c -t result name_of_the_file'
and how to repeat that for each file named 'vid_xxxx' ?
thanks a lot
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Go to the folder of the vids with "cd /sdcard/DCIM/Videos" or the appropriate and then execute this:
Code:
for i in * ; do touch -c -t "$(echo $i | sed 's/vid_*//' | sed 's;.mp4*;;' | sed 's/_//' | sed 's/..$//')" "$i" ; done
Make sure that in that folder there are only files that have the same exact filename pattern.

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scandiun said:
Go to the folder of the vids with "cd /sdcard/DCIM/Videos" or the appropriate and then execute this:
Code:
for i in * ; do touch -c -t "$(echo $i | sed 's/vid_*//' | sed 's;.mp4*;;' | sed 's/_//' | sed 's/..$//')" "$i" ; done
Make sure that in that folder there are only files that have the same exact filename pattern.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
in the folder there is img and videos but if i should put videos on a separate folder i can...
this code will do all i need ? (i think missing just "busybox" in the code)
extract the name of each file without seconds, put for each one the extraction in the command : busybox touch -c -t 201707181200 vid_20170718_120000.mp4 (for example of a file of today at 12 o'clock)

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diabolyk34 said:
in the folder there is img and videos but if i should put videos on a separate folder i can...
this code will do all i need ? (i think missing just "busybox" in the code)
extract the name of each file without seconds, put for each one the extraction in the command : busybox touch -c -t 201707181200 vid_20170718_120000.mp4 (for example of a file of today at 12 o'clock)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This code will alter only files starting with vid:
Code:
for i in vid* ; do touch -c -t "$(echo $i | sed 's/vid_*//' | sed 's;.mp4*;;' | sed 's/_//' | sed 's/..$//')" "$i" ; done
You can try with or without busybox first and see which one works for you.

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scandiun said:
This code will alter only files starting with vid:
Code:
for i in vid* ; do touch -c -t "$(echo $i | sed 's/vid_*//' | sed 's;.mp4*;;' | sed 's/_//' | sed 's/..$//')" "$i" ; done
You can try with or without busybox first and see which one works for you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thank you very much i will try this in an hour to send you the answer if it's working or not
are you a developper ? cause it seems very hard to know all that...

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i have another question, is it possible to put 1 or 2 less than the hour because of GMT ?
201707172000 should be 201707171900...

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the answer of the command (not working) is :
touch: invalid date 'VID20170717_2000'
repeat for all lines....
i think it keep too many characters.
characters keeped should be 201707172000 (without "VID" and without "_")
how to delete that from the echo ?