How to echo the time in a specified zone ?
Use the command zdump, which is called the time zone dumper
for eg :-
linuxcom:~ # zdump EST
EST Mon Mar 30 06:31:21 2009 EST
linuxcom:~ # zdump IST
IST Mon Mar 30 11:31:38 2009 GMT
Check out the man page for the same for more options.
And if you want to change the time zone of your server do the following:-
check which timezone your machine is currently using by executing `date`. You’ll see something like Sat Apr 4 15:32:31 IST 2009 ; in this case IST is the current time zone .Change to the directory /usr/share/zoneinfo here you will find a list of time zone regions. Choose the most appropriate region, if you live in Canada or the US this directory is the “America” directory.
Backup the previous timezone configuration
#mv /etc/localtime /etc/localtime-previous
Create a symbolic link from the appropiate timezone to /etc/localtime. Example:
#ln -s /usr/share/zoneinfo/Europe/Amsterdam /etc/localtime
If you have the utility rdate, update the current system time by executing
#/usr/bin/rdate -s time.nist.gov
Set the ZONE entry in the file /etc/sysconfig/clock file (e.g. “America/Los_Angeles”)
Set the hardware clock by executing: #/sbin/hwclock –systohc
