Question: In Linux, is it possible to find the actual time when a file was created first?
The Answer is NO until Ext3.
File creation time ISN’T maintained in Linux with file-system Ext3 or earlier version.
It will change when file content changes. It is explained with an example here:
It will change when file content changes. It is explained with an example here:
[adevaraju@cac1-t1 ~]$ date
Tue Nov 9 01:22:25 CST 2010 # Time now is 01:22:25
[adevaraju@cac01-t1 ~]$ echo "Some text on the file " > testfile # Creating a file
[adevaraju@cac01-t1 ~]$ ls -lc testfile
-rw-r--r-- 1 adevaraju domain users 23 Nov 9 01:22 testfile # Shows file change time as 01:22
[adevaraju@cac01-t1 ~]$ ls -lu testfile
-rw-r--r-- 1 adevaraju domain users 23 Nov 9 01:22 testfile # Access time is also 01:22
[adevaraju@cac01-t1 ~]$ cat testfile # Now am accessing the file
Some text on the file
[adevaraju@cac01-t1 ~]$ ls -lc testfile
-rw-r--r-- 1 adevaraju domain users 23 Nov 9 01:22 testfile # Change time remains the same
[adevaraju@cac01-t1 ~]$ ls -lu testfile
-rw-r--r-- 1 adevaraju domain users 23 Nov 9 01:23 testfile # Access time changed to 01:23
[adevaraju@cac01-t1 ~]$ date
Tue Nov 9 01:23:32 CST 2010
[adevaraju@cac01-t1 ~]$ echo "Additional text to the file" >> testfile # file content changed
[adevaraju@cac01-t1 ~]$ ls -lc testfile
-rw-r--r-- 1 adevaraju domain users 51 Nov 9 01:24 testfile # Change time changes to 01:24
[adevaraju@cacllm01-t1 ~]$ ls -lu testfile
-rw-r--r-- 1 adevaraju domain users 51 Nov 9 01:23 testfile # But access time remains the same since we did only changes to file.
[adevaraju@cacllm01-t1 ~]$ date
Tue Nov 9 01:24:22 CST 2010
[adevaraju@cacllm01-t1 ~]$
Atlast the original file creation time (which is 01:22) is gone, we CAN’T retrieve that information.
It is explained in this post: http://ashok-linux-tips.blogspot.com/2012/04/how-to-get-file-creation-time-in-linux.html
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