VMS Help Lexicals, F$TIME  *Conan The Librarian (sorry for the slow response - running on an old VAX)

    Returns the current date and time in absolute time format.

    The F$TIME function has no arguments, but must be followed by
    parentheses.

    Format

      F$TIME()

1 - Return Value

    A character string containing the current date and time. The
    returned string has the following fixed, 23-character format:

    dd-mmm-yyyy hh:mm:ss.cc

    When the current day of the month is any of the values 1 to 9,
    the first character in the returned string is a blank character.
    The time portion of the string is always in character position
    13, at an offset of 12 characters from the beginning of the
    string.

    Note that you must use the assignment operator (=)  to preserve
    the blank character in the returned string. If you use the string
    assignment operator (:=),  the leading blank is dropped.

2 - Example

  $ OPEN/WRITE OUTFILE DATA.DAT
  $ TIME_STAMP = F$TIME()
  $ WRITE OUTFILE TIME_STAMP

      This example shows how to use the F$TIME function to time-stamp
      a file that you create from a command procedure. OUTFILE is
      the logical name for the file DATA.DAT, which is opened for
      writing. The F$TIME function returns the current date and time
      string, and assigns this string to the symbol TIME_STAMP. The
      WRITE command writes the date and time string to OUTFILE.