From: Philip Hallstrom <ruby@...>
Date: 2006-11-15T08:52:59+09:00
Subject: Re: touch

> I need to "touch" a file from my ruby script. (This is a unix-based
> command that updates the timestamp on a file, creating it, if it
> doesn't already exist.) I'm running on Windows. A collegue found a port
> of "touch" and installed it and called it using "system", but i would
> rather see a solution that requires less installation.
>
> I am currently using the following code:
>
> class File
>   def self.touch(filename)
>      File.open(filename, 'a'){|f| f.puts ' '}
>   end
> end
>
> This implementation is good enough for my present needs (touching an
> xml file), but it has obvious side effects that could be a problem in
> other contexts.
>
> I did find a touch command in Ruby in the ptools package at
> http://sourceforge.net/projects/ruby-miscutils/ but it did not work.
> (It zeroed the file it touched!)
>
> Any suggestions for a better "touch" in Ruby?

What's wrong with FileUtils.touch() ?

http://corelib.rubyonrails.org/classes/FileUtils.html#M001802