How to display timestamp on bash command prompt?

Solution Verified - Updated -

Environment

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux
  • bash

Issue

  • How to display timestamp on bash command prompt?

Resolution

To display timestamp on command prompt, use the special character \D{} for PS1 shell variable. It is possible to display arbitrary time format by putting a special character based on strftime() function into {}.

For example, to set up a command prompt which has [<USERNAME>@<HOSTNAME> <YYYYMMDD-hh:mm:ss>]$ format, issue the following:

PS1="[\u@\h \D{%Y%m%d-%H:%M:%S}]\$ "

For more information on special characters, refer to the online manual “STRFTIME(3) man 3 strftime.”

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