From: gwtmp01@...
Date: 2006-08-17T04:26:52+09:00
Subject: Re: How do I get the creation date of a file?


On Aug 16, 2006, at 3:12 PM, rak rok wrote:
> To clarify, as Jeremy indicated, this is actually the inode  
> creation time.
> So if you mv a file around within the same mount point, the ctime  
> doesn't
> change.  If you mv accross mountpoints, a new inode gets created,  
> and ctime
> changes.

It isn't the inode creation time.  It is the inode *change* time.  So  
yes, it
is set when an inode is created but it is also changed whenever  
information in
the inode changes such as: file ownership, file permissions, file  
*length*, and
so on.

Perhaps there is something like 'file creation time' or 'inode  
creation time'
in non-Unix, non-Posix file systems.  Someone else will have to  
answer that
question.

As I said before, the concept of 'file creation time' is pretty fuzzy  
and
in any case isn't represented by any of the time stamps found in a a  
Posix-like
file system (atime, mtime, ctime).