date rejects proper parameters with -s option

[tburt]

According to the docs ( --help, man and info ) the date command is 
supposed to accept a command line of the type:

date -s MMDDhhmm

My attempts to set the system date on my system have failed with the 
following command:

address@hidden log]# date -s 10200710
date: invalid date `10200710'

I tried the following, just as an alternative and it did work...

date -s 07:10

However, this does not agree with the docs.

This is a RedHat 7.0 system that is pretty well patched up to current.  
The date binary does not reveal a revision number, but here are some 
strings that may help identify the source.

address@hidden log]# strings /bin/date | more
/lib/ld-linux.so.2
__gmon_start__
libc.so.6
... SNIP SNIP
GLIBC_2.1.3
GLIBC_2.1
GLIBC_2.0
... SNIP SNIP
Try `%s --help' for more information.
Usage: %s [OPTION]... [+FORMAT]
  or:  %s [OPTION] [MMDDhhmm[[CC]YY][.ss]]
Display the current time in the given FORMAT, or set the system date.
  -d, --date=STRING         display time described by STRING, not `now'
  -f, --file=DATEFILE       like --date once for each line of DATEFILE
  -I, --iso-8601[=TIMESPEC] output an ISO-8601 compliant date/time string.
                            TIMESPEC=`date' (or missing) for date only,
                            `hours', `minutes', or `seconds' for date and
                            time to the indicated precision.
  -r, --reference=FILE      display the last modification time of FILE
  -R, --rfc-822             output RFC-822 compliant date string
  -s, --set=STRING          set time described by STRING
  -u, --utc, --universal    print or set Coordinated Universal Time
      --help                display this help and exit
      --version             output version information and exit
FORMAT controls the output.  The only valid option for the second form
specifies Coordinated Universal Time.  Interpreted sequences are:
  %%%%   a literal %%
  %%a   locale's abbreviated weekday name (Sun..Sat)
  %%A   locale's full weekday name, variable length (Sunday..Saturday)
  %%b   locale's abbreviated month name (Jan..Dec)
  %%B   locale's full month name, variable length (January..December)
  %%c   locale's date and time (Sat Nov 04 12:02:33 EST 1989)
  %%d   day of month (01..31)
  %%D   date (mm/dd/yy)
  %%e   day of month, blank padded ( 1..31)
  %%h   same as %%b
  %%H   hour (00..23)
  %%I   hour (01..12)
  %%j   day of year (001..366)
  %%k   hour ( 0..23)
  %%l   hour ( 1..12)
  %%m   month (01..12)
  %%M   minute (00..59)
  %%n   a newline
  %%p   locale's AM or PM
  %%r   time, 12-hour (hh:mm:ss [AP]M)
  %%s   seconds since 00:00:00, Jan 1, 1970 (a GNU extension)
  %%S   second (00..60)
  %%t   a horizontal tab
  %%T   time, 24-hour (hh:mm:ss)
  %%U   week number of year with Sunday as first day of week (00..53)
  %%V   week number of year with Monday as first day of week (01..52)
  %%w   day of week (0..6);  0 represents Sunday
  %%W   week number of year with Monday as first day of week (00..53)
  %%x   locale's date representation (mm/dd/yy)
  %%X   locale's time representation (%%H:%%M:%%S)
  %%y   last two digits of year (00..99)
  %%Y   year (1970...)
  %%z   RFC-822 style numeric timezone (-0500) (a nonstandard extension)
  %%Z   time zone (e.g., EDT), or nothing if no time zone is determinable
By default, date pads numeric fields with zeroes.  GNU date recognizes
the following modifiers between `%%' and a numeric directive.
  `-' (hyphen) do not pad the field
  `_' (underscore) pad the field with spaces
Report bugs to <address@hidden>.
memory exhausted
standard input
`%s'
invalid date `%s'
TZ=UTC0
/usr/share/locale
sh-utils
d:f:I::r:Rs:u
--iso-8601
David MacKenzie

-- 
--------------------
Timothy Burt
Internet Specialist