File Times
A
file time represents the specific date and time at which a given file was created, last
accessed, or last written to. Windows records file times whenever applications
create, access, and write to files. Windows records the times using a 64-bit
value specifying the number of 100-nanosecond intervals that have elapsed since
12:00 A.M. January 1, 1601 (UTC). Writing to a file changes the last write time; writing
to or reading from the file (including running an executable file) changes the
last access time.
Note Not all file systems can record creation and last access time. In
particular, the file allocation table (FAT) file system records only last-write times.
You can retrieve the file times for a given file by using the
GetFileTime function.
GetFileTime copies the creation, last access, and last write times to individual
FILETIME structures. Each structure consists of two 32-bit values that combine to form
the single 64-bit value. You can also retrieve the file times by using the
FindFirstFile and
FindNextFile functions. These functions copy the times to
FILETIME structures in a
WIN32_FIND_DATA structure.
You can set the file times for a file by using the
SetFileTime function. This function lets you modify creation, last access, and last write
times without changing the content of the file. You can compare the times of
different files by using the
CompareFileTime function. The function compares two file times and returns a value indicating
which time is greater or returns zero if the times are equal.
To make a file time more meaningful to a user, you can extract the month, day,
year, and time of day from a file time by using the
FileTimeToSystemTime function.
FileTimeToSystemTime converts the file time and copies the individual values for date and time of
day to a
SYSTEMTIME structure.
Windows records all file times in UTC-based times, but you can convert a file
time to the local time for your time zone by using the
FileTimeToLocalFileTime function. Before displaying a file time to a user, applications typically
convert the file time to local time, then extract the month, day, year and time of
day using
FileTimeToSystemTime.
If you plan to modify file times for given files, you can convert a date and
time of day to a file time by using the
SystemTimeToFileTime function. You can also obtain the system time
FILETIME structure by calling the
GetSystemTimeAsFileTime function.
If the original date and time of day are given in the local time for your time
zone, you can convert the resulting file time to UTC by using the
LocalFileTimeToFileTime function. Always make sure the file times you set using
SetFileTime are valid UTC-based times.
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