Use touch command to Create a File, Change a File, and Modify Timestamps

touch - In Linux/Unix operating system touch command is used to create, change and modify timestamps of a file.

The general syntax of touch command.

touch [OPTION]... FILE...

Brief description of options available with the touch command.

In this example, a new file is created without content using the touch command touch <file name>

In this example, using the touch command you can create multiple files at a time touch <first file> <second file> <third file> …

In this example, Using -a (access time) option you can modify the last access time of a file. Here the date command is used to display the current date and time. you can see that after using -a option with the touch command the last access time is changed.

In this example, **newfile.txt** is not available in hope directory and after using -c option with the touch command you can see that newfile.txt is not created.

In this example, you can see the time of the available file and details using the ll command. After using touch --reference=newfile.txt main.c time of **main.c** file charged to the **newfile.txt** file instead of the current time.

In this tutorial, we covered how to create, change, and modify timestamps of a file in the Linux operating system using touch command with available options and suitable examples.