Greetings, wizards!

I've a bit of a puzzler here: the comparison of file ages as returned by stat() vs those given by ls.

1. "ls -Flu" on a given file returns an access date of 08 July, 2004.
2. "ls -Flc" gives a modification date on that file of 08 July, 2004.
3. stat() on the same file gives atime = 1089270507, mtime = 1070566444.

The interesting thing is that when I use the lesser of the times returned by stat() to calculate an age, the following is the result:

$stat_age = (today (in e-seconds) - min( atime, mtime ) + 43200)/86400
= (1092168958 - 1070566444 + 43200)/ 86400
= 250

So what? Well, atime should correlate to access date, and mtime to modification date, right? So how come a file a bit more than a month old (the dates & times were acquired on 10 August), according to ls, shows up as being a bit over EIGHT months old according to stat()?

Most important: how can I determine *which* of these ages is correct? I'm trying to create a file aging report to determine which files haven't been touched for a certain period of time. I have to know that I'm getting accurate INPUT if I want to have any hope of accurate OUTPUT--I'm trying to avoid a GIGO situation here. Any help in the resolution of this dilemma would be appreciated.

Thanks!

In reply to ls dates vs stat() ages by Dismas

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