# Date & Time

&Mike.McBride; &Mike.McBride.mail;
2009-11-22
4.4
KDE
Systemsettings
clock
date
time
set
configure

## Date & Time

You can use this module to alter the system date and time, using a convenient graphical interface.

As these settings do not only affect you as a user, but rather the whole system, you must have system administrator (root) access to change the system date and time. If you do not have this access level, this module will only show you the current settings, but your changes will not be saved.

### Date and Time tab

If you check Set date and time automatically you are able to select a Time server from the drop down box and all other settings in this dialog are disabled.

The applications `rdate` or `ntpdate` are used in this module to fetch date and time from a time server. This happens when you log in to &kde; while being online or when you later connect to the Internet and access to time servers is possible.

Both applications are simple NTP clients that set a system's clock to match the time obtained by communicating with one or more NTP servers. This is not sufficient, however, for maintaining an accurate clock in the long run. This is useful for occasionally setting the time on machines that do not have full-time network access, such as laptops.

If you do not use a time server, you are able to set the date manually using the lower half of the tab. Simply choose your month and year using the controls at the top of the calendar and the day of the month by clicking on the day in the calendar.

Use the controls at the bottom of the calendar to select the current date, enter the date in the edit box or select the week of the year from the drop down box.

You set the time using the spin boxes at the bottom of the analog clock. You can also directly enter your value.

The time is represented in 24 hour format. If you want the system time to be set to 8:00 PM, you need to set the hour spinbox to 20 (8 + 12). If you want the system time set to 8:00 AM, you should set the hour spinbox to 8.

### Time Zone tab

To set a new time zone, simply select your area from the list below.