I was looking at an old sandbox I have that contains some partially-made changes to the documentation of -atime and related predicates.
In find.texi is: @deffn Test -atime [+|-]n @deffnx Test -ctime [+|-]n @deffnx Test -mtime [+|-]n True if the file was last accessed (or its status changed, or it was modified) (exactly/more than/less than) n' @var{n}*24 hours ago. The number of 24-hour periods since the file's timestamp is always rounded down; therefore 0 means ``less than 24 hours ago'', 1 means ``between 24 and 48 hours ago'', and so forth. Fractional values are supported but this only really makes sense for the case where ranges (@samp{+@var{n}} and @samp{-@var{n}}) are used. @end deffn You can see the change I made, which is to correct the syntax from "-atime n" to "-atime [+|-]n". But that isn't what I'm asking about here. My question is the measning of "Fractional values are supported but this only really makes sense for the case where ranges (@samp{+@var{n}} and @samp{-@var{n}}) are used." What is the "vlaue" that it is talking about, is it the "n" in the predicate or the "number of 24-hour periods since ..."? The meaning seems to be the former (since the latter would contradict how the atime value is computed), but the usage of fractional "n" would not seem to be very useful, since a fractional "n" could always be replaced with an integral "n" with the same effect. Thanks, Dale