I wanted to format the output of the command "time" by adding -f,  this returns an error,  -h and --help are missing too. What are the accepted options ?  thanks

man time

 

"time" is "built in" into the shell.

 

In order to use the full version described by "man", you should first install the full version in /usr/bin/time :

 

# apt-get install time.

 

And call it with the full path.

 

Also, when man fail to give doc because a package is missing, just google "man cmd".

Thanks to arox and my bad : I was trying to use some full version's option in the built in version of time. 
No need to install time, it's done in armbian, just give the full path\command :

 

root@Bpi2+:~# time -f

-f: command not found

 

real 0m0,484s

user 0m0,396s

sys 0m0,089s

root@Bpi2+:~# which time

/usr/bin/time

root@Bpi2+:~# /usr/bin/time -f

/usr/bin/time: option requires an argument -- 'f'

Usage: /usr/bin/time [-apvV] [-f format] [-o file] [--append] [--verbose]

       [--portability] [--format=format] [--output=file] [--version]

       [--quiet] [--help] command [arg...]

root@Bpi2+:~# /usr/bin/time -f "%E" curl www.orange.fr

0:00.27

 

In such case type "type time" and the shell will inform you (is a shell keyword").

Thank You again I wanted to script some test and collect the results and this format is useful for this.

 

My next step is to remove the ':' in the output (is not trivial to combine 'time' and pipe without writing the output in a file, may be I have to try something else).

Be patient I can only write one post/day....

 

It's nice to have so small SBC and so large facilities and community.  Thank You Armbian !

 

@Werner & @Igor Thank You for replying (maybe too fast ?) but You are wrong when You think that I did'nt red the man pages ... it was more complex.

 

In shell, pipes and awk are your bests friends : perhaps something like this :

 

$ mkfifo /tmp/timefifo

$ awk -W interactive -F: '{printf("cmd=%s s=%f\n", $1, $2*60+$3)}' <>/tmp/timefifo > /tmp/stats &  

 

$ /usr/bin/time -o /tmp/timefifo -f "%C:%E" ls -l
$ /usr/bin/time -o /tmp/timefifo -f "%C:%E" ls
$ /usr/bin/time -o /tmp/timefifo -f "%C:%E" who

$ cat /tmp/stats

cmd=ls -l s=0.700000
cmd=ls s=0.070000

cmd=who s=0.000000

 

$ killall awk

N.B.  : <> open the pipe in read/wite mode to prevent it to be closed when "time" send EOF.

Often the best solutions are the simplest

 

I have tested the mamed pipe thru three small scripts :

 

=> the first one is called by snmpcd (snmp formating)

echo .1.3.6.1.2.1.25.1.8.0

echo Gauge32

bash /usr/bin/local/secondscript

 

=> the secondscript with awk and named pipe :

FIFO="/tmp/timefifo"

[[ -e $FIFO ]] &&  rm $FIFO    # if present then suppress it

mkfifo $FIFO 

awk -W interactive '{printf("%-6d \n", $1*1000)}' <> $FIFO > /tmp/stats &

/usr/bin/time -o $FIFO -f "%e" /usr/bin/thirdscript

cat /tmp/stats

killall awk

[[ -e $FIFO ]] && rm $FIFO

 

=> the third script :define the operation You want to know the during :

 

URL="example.html"

for i in `seq 1 20`;

do

         curl $URL > /dev/null 2>&1

done

 

********   It works, but there is a more simple solution : 

echo .1.3.6.1.2.1.25.1.8.0

echo Gauge32

before=$(date +%s%N)

curl http://example.html > /dev/null 2>/dev/null

after=$(date +%s%N)

echo $((((after-before))/1000))

********** result in microsecond

On 6/22/2021 at 5:33 AM, Werner said:

Often the best solutions are the simplest

 

 

"called by snmpcd (snmp formating)"

 

As you and Werner say : the best solutions are often the simplest. The problem is to find what is really the simplest and to make the difference between simple and basic in a use case.

 

(This is just a bit of general thinking (and nostalgy), as I have no idea about what you are working on).

 

The **simple** network management protocol is surely basic but I never found it was simple and it has been a long time since I saw someone care about it.

 

One more time, this is just general thinking, but I feel we use today a lot of complicated but no so powerful technologies in IT. Linux is a unix derivative, UNix  has been designed by people who wanted a simple but powerful system after having worked on MULTix.

 

I try to keep that in mind. But it is not always easy and cannot be achieve if we want our computers to also toast bread and do the laundry.