---
name: "lutimes"
section: "2"
platform: "linux"
package: "freebsd-manpages"
version: "6.0-5"
release: "Debian 4.0 (Etch)"
platforms: ["linux", "freebsd"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/lutimes"
---

# lutimes(2)

set file access and modification times

## NAME

**utimes**, **lutimes**, **futimes** – set file access and modification times

## LIBRARY

Standard C Library (libc, -lc)

## SYNOPSIS

**#include \<sys/time.h\>**

*int*\

**utimes**(*const char \*path*, *const struct timeval \*times*);

*int*\

**lutimes**(*const char \*path*, *const struct timeval \*times*);

*int*\

**futimes**(*int fd*, *const struct timeval \*times*);

## DESCRIPTION

The access and modification times of the file named by *path* or referenced by *fd* are changed as specified by the argument *times*.

If *times* is NULL, the access and modification times are set to the current time. The caller must be the owner of the file, have permission to write the file, or be the super-user.

If *times* is non-NULL, it is assumed to point to an array of two timeval structures. The access time is set to the value of the first element, and the modification time is set to the value of the second element. For file systems that support file birth (creation) times (such as UFS2), the birth time will be set to the value of the second element if the second element is older than the currently set birth time. To set both a birth time and a modification time, two calls are required; the first to set the birth time and the second to set the (presumably newer) modification time. Ideally a new system call will be added that allows the setting of all three times at once. The caller must be the owner of the file or be the super-user.

In either case, the inode-change-time of the file is set to the current time.

The **lutimes**() system call is like **utimes**() except in the case where the named file is a symbolic link, in which case **lutimes**() changes the access and modification times of the link, while **utimes**() changes the times of the file the link references.

## RETURN VALUES

The **utimes()** function returns the value 0 if successful; otherwise the value -1 is returned and the global variable errno is set to indicate the error.

## ERRORS

The **utimes**() and **lutimes**() system calls will fail if:

- \[EACCES\]

  Search permission is denied for a component of the path prefix; or the *times* argument is NULL and the effective user ID of the process does not match the owner of the file, and is not the super-user, and write access is denied.

- \[EFAULT\]

  The *path* or *times* argument points outside the process's allocated address space.

- \[EIO\]

  An I/O error occurred while reading or writing the affected inode.

- \[ELOOP\]

  Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating the pathname.

- \[ENAMETOOLONG\]

  A component of a pathname exceeded NAME\_MAX characters, or an entire path name exceeded PATH\_MAX characters.

- \[ENOENT\]

  The named file does not exist.

- \[ENOTDIR\]

  A component of the path prefix is not a directory.

- \[EPERM\]

  The *times* argument is not NULL and the calling process's effective user ID does not match the owner of the file and is not the super-user.

- \[EROFS\]

  The file system containing the file is mounted read-only.

The **futimes**() system call will fail if:

- \[EBADF\]

  The *fd* argument does not refer to a valid descriptor.

All of the system calls will fail if:

- \[EACCES\]

  The *times* argument is NULL and the effective user ID of the process does not match the owner of the file, and is not the super-user, and write access is denied.

- \[EFAULT\]

  The *times* argument points outside the process's allocated address space.

- \[EIO\]

  An I/O error occurred while reading or writing the affected inode.

- \[EPERM\]

  The *times* argument is not NULL and the calling process's effective user ID does not match the owner of the file and is not the super-user.

- \[EROFS\]

  The file system containing the file is mounted read-only.

## SEE ALSO

[stat(2)](/stat/2.md), [utime(3)](/utime/3.md)

## HISTORY

The **utimes**() system call appeared in 4.2BSD. The **futimes**() and **lutimes**() system calls first appeared in FreeBSD 3.0.