How to calculate time difference in bash script?

Question

I print the start and end time using date +"%T", which results in something like:

10:33:56
10:36:10

How could I calculate and print the difference between these two?

I would like to get something like:

2m 14s

Answer 1

I realize this is an older post, but I came it across it today while working on a script that would take dates and times from a log file and compute the delta. The script below is certainly overkill, and I highly recommend checking my logic and maths.

#!/bin/bash

dTime=""
tmp=""

#firstEntry="$(head -n 1 "$LOG" | sed 's/.*] \([0-9: -]\+\).*/\1/')"
firstEntry="2013-01-16 01:56:37"
#lastEntry="$(tac "$LOG" | head -n 1 | sed 's/.*] \([0-9: -]\+\).*/\1/')"
lastEntry="2014-09-17 18:24:02"

# I like to make the variables easier to parse
firstEntry="${firstEntry//-/ }"
lastEntry="${lastEntry//-/ }"
firstEntry="${firstEntry//:/ }"
lastEntry="${lastEntry//:/ }"

# remove the following lines in production
echo "$lastEntry"
echo "$firstEntry"

# compute days in last entry
for i in `seq 1 $(echo $lastEntry|awk '{print $2}')`; do {
  case "$i" in
   1|3|5|7|8|10|12 )
    dTime=$(($dTime+31))
    ;;
   4|6|9|11 )
    dTime=$(($dTime+30))
    ;;
   2 )
    dTime=$(($dTime+28))
    ;;
  esac
} done

# do leap year calculations for all years between first and last entry
for i in `seq $(echo $firstEntry|awk '{print $1}') $(echo $lastEntry|awk '{print $1}')`; do {
  if [ $(($i%4)) -eq 0 ] && [ $(($i%100)) -eq 0 ] && [ $(($i%400)) -eq 0 ]; then {
    if [ "$i" = "$(echo $firstEntry|awk '{print $1}')" ] && [ $(echo $firstEntry|awk '{print $2}') -lt 2 ]; then {
      dTime=$(($dTime+1))
    } elif [ $(echo $firstEntry|awk '{print $2}') -eq 2 ] && [ $(echo $firstEntry|awk '{print $3}') -lt 29 ]; then {
      dTime=$(($dTime+1))
    } fi
  } elif [ $(($i%4)) -eq 0 ] && [ $(($i%100)) -ne 0 ]; then {
    if [ "$i" = "$(echo $lastEntry|awk '{print $1}')" ] && [ $(echo $lastEntry|awk '{print $2}') -gt 2 ]; then {
      dTime=$(($dTime+1))
    } elif [ $(echo $lastEntry|awk '{print $2}') -eq 2 ] && [ $(echo $lastEntry|awk '{print $3}') -ne 29 ]; then {
      dTime=$(($dTime+1))
    } fi
  } fi
} done

# substract days in first entry
for i in `seq 1 $(echo $firstEntry|awk '{print $2}')`; do {
  case "$i" in
   1|3|5|7|8|10|12 )
    dTime=$(($dTime-31))
    ;;
   4|6|9|11 )
    dTime=$(($dTime-30))
    ;;
   2 )
    dTime=$(($dTime-28))
    ;;
  esac
} done

dTime=$(($dTime+$(echo $lastEntry|awk '{print $3}')-$(echo $firstEntry|awk '{print $3}')))

# The above gives number of days for sample. Now we need hours, minutes, and seconds
# As a bit of hackery I just put the stuff in the best order for use in a for loop
dTime="$(($(echo $lastEntry|awk '{print $6}')-$(echo $firstEntry|awk '{print $6}'))) $(($(echo $lastEntry|awk '{print $5}')-$(echo $firstEntry|awk '{print $5}'))) $(($(echo $lastEntry|awk '{print $4}')-$(echo $firstEntry|awk '{print $4}'))) $dTime"
tmp=1
for i in $dTime; do {
  if [ $i -lt 0 ]; then {
    case "$tmp" in
     1 )
      tmp="$(($(echo $dTime|awk '{print $1}')+60)) $(($(echo $dTime|awk '{print $2}')-1))"
      dTime="$tmp $(echo $dTime|awk '{print $3" "$4}')"
      tmp=1
      ;;
     2 )
      tmp="$(($(echo $dTime|awk '{print $2}')+60)) $(($(echo $dTime|awk '{print $3}')-1))"
      dTime="$(echo $dTime|awk '{print $1}') $tmp $(echo $dTime|awk '{print $4}')"
      tmp=2
      ;;
     3 )
      tmp="$(($(echo $dTime|awk '{print $3}')+24)) $(($(echo $dTime|awk '{print $4}')-1))"
      dTime="$(echo $dTime|awk '{print $1" "$2}') $tmp"
      tmp=3
      ;;
    esac
  } fi
  tmp=$(($tmp+1))
} done

echo "The sample time is $(echo $dTime|awk '{print $4}') days, $(echo $dTime|awk '{print $3}') hours, $(echo $dTime|awk '{print $2}') minutes, and $(echo $dTime|awk '{print $1}') seconds."

You will get output as follows.

2012 10 16 01 56 37
2014 09 17 18 24 02
The sample time is 700 days, 16 hours, 27 minutes, and 25 seconds.

I modified the script a bit to make it standalone (ie. just set variable values), but maybe the general idea comes across as well. You'd might want some additional error checking for negative values.

Answer 2

I needed a time difference script for use with mencoder (its --endpos is relative), and my solution is to call a Python script:

$ ./timediff.py 1:10:15 2:12:44
1:02:29

fractions of seconds are also supported:

$ echo "diff is `./timediff.py 10:51.6 12:44` (in hh:mm:ss format)"
diff is 0:01:52.4 (in hh:mm:ss format)

and it can tell you that the difference between 200 and 120 is 1h 20m:

$ ./timediff.py 120:0 200:0
1:20:0

and can convert any (probably fractional) number of seconds or minutes or hours to hh:mm:ss

$ ./timediff.py 0 3600
1:00:0
$ ./timediff.py 0 3.25:0:0
3:15:0

timediff.py:

#!/usr/bin/python

import sys

def x60(h,m):
    return 60*float(h)+float(m)

def seconds(time):
    try:
       h,m,s = time.split(':')
       return x60(x60(h,m),s)
    except ValueError:
       try:
          m,s = time.split(':')
          return x60(m,s)
       except ValueError:
          return float(time)

def difftime(start, end):
    d = seconds(end) - seconds(start)
    print '%d:%02d:%s' % (d/3600,d/60%60,('%02f' % (d%60)).rstrip('0').rstrip('.'))

if __name__ == "__main__":
   difftime(sys.argv[1],sys.argv[2])

Answer 3

I can't comment on mcaleaa's answer, hence I post this here. The "diff" variable should be on small case. Here is an example.

[root@test ~]# date1=$(date +"%s"); date
Wed Feb 21 23:00:20 MYT 2018
[root@test ~]# 
[root@test ~]# date2=$(date +"%s"); date
Wed Feb 21 23:00:33 MYT 2018
[root@test ~]# 
[root@test ~]# diff=$(($date2-$date1))
[root@test ~]# 

Previous variable was declared on lower case. This is what happened when upper case is used.

[root@test ~]# echo "Duration: $(($DIFF / 3600 )) hours $((($DIFF % 3600) / 60)) minutes $(($DIFF % 60)) seconds"
-bash: / 3600 : syntax error: operand expected (error token is "/ 3600 ")
[root@test ~]# 

So, quick fix would be like this

[root@test ~]# echo "Duration: $(($diff / 3600 )) hours $((($diff % 3600) / 60)) minutes $(($diff % 60)) seconds"
Duration: 0 hours 0 minutes 13 seconds
[root@test ~]# 

Answer 4

With GNU units:

$ units
2411 units, 71 prefixes, 33 nonlinear units
You have: (10hr+36min+10s)-(10hr+33min+56s)
You want: s
    * 134
    / 0.0074626866
You have: (10hr+36min+10s)-(10hr+33min+56s)
You want: min
    * 2.2333333
    / 0.44776119

Answer 5

Here's some magic:

time1=14:30
time2=$( date +%H:%M ) # 16:00
diff=$(  echo "$time2 - $time1"  | sed 's%:%+(1/60)*%g' | bc -l )
echo $diff hours
# outputs 1.5 hours

sed replaces a : with a formula to convert to 1/60. Then the time calculation that is made by bc

Answer 6

Following on from Daniel Kamil Kozar's answer, to show hours/minutes/seconds:

echo "Duration: $(($DIFF / 3600 )) hours $((($DIFF % 3600) / 60)) minutes $(($DIFF % 60)) seconds"

So the full script would be:

date1=$(date +"%s")
date2=$(date +"%s")
diff=$(($date2-$date1))
echo "Duration: $(($DIFF / 3600 )) hours $((($DIFF % 3600) / 60)) minutes $(($DIFF % 60)) seconds"