From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG  Sat Nov 10 05:44:06 2007
Return-Path: <owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG>
Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34])
	by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8F99216A419
	for <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>;
	Sat, 10 Nov 2007 05:44:06 +0000 (UTC)
	(envelope-from jonathan+freebsd-questions@hst.org.za)
Received: from hermes.hst.org.za (onix.hst.org.za [209.203.2.133])
	by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C9D0313C4A5
	for <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>;
	Sat, 10 Nov 2007 05:44:05 +0000 (UTC)
	(envelope-from jonathan+freebsd-questions@hst.org.za)
Received: from [10.1.11.1] ([10.1.11.1]) (authenticated bits=0)
	by hermes.hst.org.za (8.13.8/8.13.8) with ESMTP id lAA5g49U025395
	(version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NO)
	for <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>;
	Sat, 10 Nov 2007 07:42:04 +0200 (SAST)
	(envelope-from jonathan+freebsd-questions@hst.org.za)
From: Jonathan McKeown <jonathan+freebsd-questions@hst.org.za>
To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Date: Sat, 10 Nov 2007 07:45:43 +0200
User-Agent: KMail/1.9.4
References: <47349D10.20709@ourweb.net>
	<7EA6F842-7C0D-4EFC-BF4D-DD83B0524597@gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <7EA6F842-7C0D-4EFC-BF4D-DD83B0524597@gmail.com>
Organization: Health Systems Trust
X-Face: $@VrUx^RHy/}yu]jKf/<4T%/d|F+$j-Ol2"2J$q+%OK1]&/G_S9(=?iso-8859-1?q?HkaQ*=60!=3FYOK=3FY!=27M=60C=0A=09aP=5C9nVPF8Q=7DCilHH8l?=
	=?iso-8859-1?q?=3B=7E!42HK6=273lg4J=7Daz?=@1Dqqh:J]M^"YPn*2IWrZON$1+G?oX3@
	=?iso-8859-1?q?k=230=0A=0954XDRg=3DYn=5FF-etwot4U=24b?=<FO&kjQCGnjz>dTS{i<i?:=p!]'t#K~4)cr7o%ygQiso
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain;
  charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Content-Disposition: inline
Message-Id: <200711100745.43287.jonathan+freebsd-questions@hst.org.za>
X-Spam-Score: -4.293 () ALL_TRUSTED,AWL,BAYES_00
X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.61 on 209.203.2.133
Subject: Re: shell programming
X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5
Precedence: list
List-Id: User questions <freebsd-questions.freebsd.org>
List-Unsubscribe: <http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions>, 
	<mailto:freebsd-questions-request@freebsd.org?subject=unsubscribe>
List-Archive: <http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-questions>
List-Post: <mailto:freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>
List-Help: <mailto:freebsd-questions-request@freebsd.org?subject=help>
List-Subscribe: <http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions>, 
	<mailto:freebsd-questions-request@freebsd.org?subject=subscribe>
X-List-Received-Date: Sat, 10 Nov 2007 05:44:06 -0000

On Friday 09 November 2007 20:02, Eric Crist wrote:
> On Nov 9, 2007, at 11:46 AM, Bill Banks wrote:
> > I'm  writing a backup script. I need to get the day of the week into
> > a variable. How can I do it?
>
> Well, it depends on what you're using.  If you're using sh, see `man
> date`.  If you're using perl, it's quite complicated.

Not really:

use POSIX 'strftime';
my $day_of_week = strftime '%A', localtime;

POSIX has always been a core module. To see this in action from a commandline,

perl -MPOSIX=strftime -le 'print strftime q/%A/, localtime'

Jonathan