Ubuntu Linux has a rich set of commands for manipulating and accessing files. The stat utility gives detailed access to file information, including last accessed and last modified file time.

From the terminal window, run the command with this syntax:

stat filename

Here’s an example of checking the last time I’ve run Firefox on one of my machines:

[geek@ubuntu firefox]# stat firefox-bin
  File: `firefox-bin'
  Size: 9781136         Blocks: 19136      IO Block: 4096   Regular File
Device: 302h/770d       Inode: 555615      Links: 1    
Access: (0755/-rwxr-xr-x)  Uid: (  500/  geek)   Gid: (  500/  geek)
Access: 2006-01-14 17:41:15.000000000 -0500
Modify: 2005-05-11 14:17:00.000000000 -0400
Change: 2005-05-13 23:31:44.000000000 -0400

I guess I haven’t used that box in a while… last time I used firefox was january 14th.

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Lowell is the founder and CEO of How-To Geek. He’s been running the show since creating the site back in 2006. Over the last decade, Lowell has personally written more than 1000 articles which have been viewed by over 250 million people. Prior to starting How-To Geek, Lowell spent 15 years working in IT doing consulting, cybersecurity, database management, and programming work.
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