Here's a quick alias that will start up a timer and report the total time after a control-C.
alias timer='which banner>/dev/null 2>&1;[ $? -eq 0 ]&&c=banner||c=echo;export ts=$(date +%s);p='\''$(date -u -d @"$(($(date +%s)-$ts))" +"%H.%M.%S")'\'';watch -n 1 -t $c $p;eval "echo $p"'
This is a Mac version of the same thing, requires at least watch to be installed:
alias timer='which banner>/dev/null 2>&1;[ $? -eq 0 ]&&c=banner||c=echo;export ts=$(date +%s);p='\''$(date -u -r "$(($(date +%s)-$ts))" +"%H.%M.%S")'\'';watch -n 1 -t $c $p;eval "echo $p"'
Both versions checks whether or not banner is installed, if it is you should see:
#### #### #### #### #### #####
# ## # ## # ## # ## # ## #
# # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #
# # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #
## # ## # ### ## # ## # ### ## # #
# # # # ### # # # # ### # # #
#### #### ### #### #### ### #### #
Otherwise it will use echo:
00.01.51
Toss that in your .profile for quick access to a CLI timer.