[pdftex] current filename and current filedate ?

[Heiko Oberdiek]

On Fri, Dec 19, 2003 at 07:31:39AM +0000, Robin Fairbairns wrote:

> > I would like to obtain not only the date/time at which pdflatex is 
> > running, but I would like to obtain the date+time+name of the current 
> > file (which can be an include'd file; each one is a chapter, so this 
> > would make for a nice "this chapter was last edited on dec 3, 2004".  I 
> > am not using revision control, or any other fancy mechanism.   is this 
> > possible?
> 
> no.

It is possible to use \immediate\write18{...} to run an external
program that gets and prepares the desired piece of information
and writes the result into a file that can be input at TeX level.
(Instead of the risky \write18 the external program can be run
before. Then it collects the file dates of all desired files
and writes these in a file with the file name.)

> get it under revision control and use the check-in records.

But having revision control is much better.

Yours sincerely
  Heiko <oberdiek at uni-freiburg.de>
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