Worrying behavior about file dates with Sequoia

Question

Level 10

423,917 points

Worrying behavior about file dates with Sequoia

I am looking at a bunch of TextEdit files I modified last night over a 3 hour interval before going to bed at 11 pm. On two of them the modification dates say they were modified "Today" at 2:57 this morning. On 20 others the modification times were at one minute intervals starting at 04:16 this morning (I probably did edit the first two 2 hours before I did the rest). So the time intervals make sense, but the absolute times are ridiculous. I am the only computer user here. Yes, my clock is correct (at least it is whenever I am looking at it).

I have noticed in a few other instances since starting to use Sequoia a few weeks ago where I have downloaded files from the Internet and they had modification dates of "tomorrow".

This isn't happening with all files. Last night I also left an encoder doing a batch job on other files and the files were "last modified" at the expected intervals and expected times during the night.

Mac mini (M4)

Posted on Aug 14, 2025 09:35 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Camelot

Level 9

57,873 points

Aug 14, 2025 10:26 AM in response to Limnos

Do the time differences correspond with your timezone offset from UTC?

It sounds like the times are off by 5 hours, which might make sense if you're in US Eastern timezone, which is 5 hours off UTC.

Doesn't directly address the problem, but it might help set direction.

You say it doesn't happen with all files, only specific ones - e.g. TextEdit files, but not encoder jobs, so that might pinpoint something like synched vs. local-only files, so it might be application-specific.

It might also be something relevant to where the documents are being saved, e.g. your ~/Documents folder vs. some other folder used by your encoder. Can you narrow this down at all?

Reply

Answer 2

Aug 14, 2025 09:57 AM in response to Limnos

Verify your software is up to date…

The current stable release of Sequoia including bug fixes, security updates is macOS 15.6

Keep your Mac up to date - Apple Support

To be proactive you can file a bug report / submit your Apple Feedback here: Product Feedback - Apple

Not sure what to say beyond that...

—in an effort to remediate the issue if it is a corrupt plist you can try —from the Terminal.app copy & paste:

sudo rm /var/db/timed/com.apple.timed.plist

this will remove the plist, a reboot will rebuild it.

—Further you can resync to Apple's time server, copy and paste:

sudo sntp -sS time.apple.com

(note—your psswd will not echo on screen type it in anyway, use the enter\return key to proceed. Quit Terminal.)

Reply

Answer 3

Limnos Author

Level 10

423,917 points

Aug 14, 2025 03:06 PM in response to Camelot

I too was wondering if they were getting a Cupertino timestamp. I'm in USA Central time zone. I don't have iCloud Drive turned on for anything (and these files are all on an external drive).

I'll have to more carefully monitor the issue. I've noticed the "tomorrow" date issue on several previous occasions. I think it was with files being downloaded, but again I didn't keep track. Probably then I attributed it possibly being something about the file formatting or something.

It was the times on those TextEdit files that really surprised me. I don't think it was wrong yesterday, though I probably wasn't paying attention. Both the files I edited and the files that encoded overnight were directed to an external drive. I also don't know when this happened. I only noticed this on this group of files this morning because I saw a bunch of "Today"s in the last modified column in finder and that was 10 minutes after I got up this morning. It was pretty noticeable, whereas usually I don't pay much attention to those times.

I just looked at a second bunch of TextEdit files I edited yesterday afternoon that I then copied onto an archive drive, and they have believable timestamps.

Reply

Answer 4

Limnos Author

Level 10

423,917 points

Aug 14, 2025 09:52 AM in response to leroydouglas

Yes, it is up to date.

Reply