How can we compare the time format such that [ 00:00:10 and 00:00:22 ]?

Question

I have the execution times of program which are like so 00:00:10, 00:30:23

The question is how can I compare them to each other?

val1="00:00:10"
val2="00:30:23"

if [ "$val1" -gt "$val2" ]; then
    echo "bigger"
else
    echo "smaller"
fi

this give an error that they are not INTEGERS.

So, when I changed the code without -gt to > it does not work too..

Could you let me know how can we compare the time formats such that I explained above ?

Thank a lot..

Answer 1

You can instead use [[ "$val1" > "$val2" ]] to compare dates:

?$ if [[ 00:00:10 > 00:30:23 ]]; then echo yes; else echo no; fi
no
?$ if [[ 00:00:10 < 00:30:23 ]]; then echo yes; else echo no; fi
yes