[SOLVED] Date: option requires an argument

Issue

Can someone tell me what I'm doing wrong, please?

I've got this block of code

  if [ -n "${MFA_Exp}" ]; then
    exp_sec="$(expr '(' $(date -d "${MFA_Exp}" +%s) - $(date +%s) ')' )";
    if [ "${exp_sec}" -gt 0 ]; then
      output+=", MFA TTL: $(date -u -d @"${exp_sec}" +"%Hh %Mm %Ss")";
    else
      output+=", MFA DEAD!";
    fi;

that should output the expiration time of my MFA token, but I get this error

date: option requires an argument -- d
usage: date [-jnRu] [-d dst] [-r seconds] [-t west] [-v[+|-]val[ymwdHMS]] ...
            [-f fmt date | [[[mm]dd]HH]MM[[cc]yy][.ss]] [+format]

I'm on a Macbook and I suspect it's something to do with the date format. I'm just not sure what it is.

Solution

The default date format for BSD date is [[[mm]dd]HH]MM[[cc]yy][.ss]]. If MFS_Exp is in that format, you can use

exp_sec=$(( $(date -j "$MFS_Exp" +%s) - $(date +%s) ))

If not, you need to specify the input format using the -f option. For example, if your string is like 2020-12-18 12:34:56, then use date -j -f '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S' "$MFS_Exp" +%s.

For the second call, I wouldn't recommend using date at all, as you are working with a duration, not a timestamp.

hours=$(( exp_sec / 3600 ))
rem=$(( exp_sec % 3600 ))
minutes=$(( rem / 60 ))
sec=$(( rem % 60 ))
output+=", MFA TTL: ${hours}h ${minutes}m ${sec}s"

Answered By - chepner

Answer Checked By - Dawn Plyler (WPSolving Volunteer)