21.14 Automatically Appending the Date to a Filename

I suppose this falls into the category of "stupid tricks" but I still find it useful sometimes. I created a simple alias called vid , which I use to create and edit a file with a date as part of the filename.

I find it handy for repetitive reports and memos.

The alias looks like this:

alias vid "vi \!:1.`date +%m.%d`"

and given an argument like memo or status , appends the date as an extension. Using wildcards, I can then list all my memos of a particular date or a particular subject:

% 

ls status*


status.02.18
status.03.10
% 

ls *3.10


budget.03.10
status.03.10

If I wanted to add the year, I'd put a dot or other separator, followed by %y in the specification to the date command.

If you understand backquote interpolation ( 9.16 ) and the formats for the date ( 51.10 ) command, you can easily develop variations of this alias that work with other commands besides vi .