Converting timestamp to time ago in PHP e.g 1 day

Question

I am trying to convert a timestamp of the format 2009-09-12 20:57:19 and turn it into something like 3 minutes ago with PHP.

I found a useful script to do this, but I think it's looking for a different format to be used as the time variable. The script I'm wanting to modify to work with this format is:

function _ago($tm,$rcs = 0) {
    $cur_tm = time(); 
    $dif = $cur_tm-$tm;
    $pds = array('second','minute','hour','day','week','month','year','decade');
    $lngh = array(1,60,3600,86400,604800,2630880,31570560,315705600);

    for($v = sizeof($lngh)-1; ($v >= 0)&&(($no = $dif/$lngh[$v])<=1); $v--); if($v < 0) $v = 0; $_tm = $cur_tm-($dif%$lngh[$v]);
        $no = floor($no);
        if($no <> 1)
            $pds[$v] .='s';
        $x = sprintf("%d %s ",$no,$pds[$v]);
        if(($rcs == 1)&&($v >= 1)&&(($cur_tm-$_tm) > 0))
            $x .= time_ago($_tm);
        return $x;
    }

I think on those first few lines the script is trying to do something that looks like this (different date format math):

$dif = 1252809479 - 2009-09-12 20:57:19;

How would I go about converting my timestamp into that (unix?) format?

Answer 1

Yo can use:

date("Y-m-d H:i:s",strtotime("1 day ago"));

Answer 2

This is actually a better solution I've found. Uses jQuery however it works perfectly. Also it refreshes automatically similar to the way SO and Facebook does so you don't have to refresh the page to see the updates.

This plugin will read your datetime attr in the <time> tag and fill it in for you.

e.g. "4 minutes ago" or "about 1 day ago

http://timeago.yarp.com/

Answer 3

I found results like the following ugly:

1 years, 2 months, 0 days, 0 hours, 53 minutes and 1 seconds

Because of that I realized a function that respects plurals, removes empty values and optionally it is possible to shorten the output:

function since($timestamp, $level=6) {
    global $lang;
    $date = new DateTime();
    $date->setTimestamp($timestamp);
    $date = $date->diff(new DateTime());
    // build array
    $since = json_decode($date->format('{"year":%y,"month":%m,"day":%d,"hour":%h,"minute":%i,"second":%s}'), true);
    // remove empty date values
    $since = array_filter($since);
    // output only the first x date values
    $since = array_slice($since, 0, $level);
    // build string
    $last_key = key(array_slice($since, -1, 1, true));
    $string = '';
    foreach ($since as $key => $val) {
        // separator
        if ($string) {
            $string .= $key != $last_key ? ', ' : ' ' . $lang['and'] . ' ';
        }
        // set plural
        $key .= $val > 1 ? 's' : '';
        // add date value
        $string .= $val . ' ' . $lang[ $key ];
    }
    return $string;
}

Looks much better:

1 year, 2 months, 53 minutes and 1 second

Optionally use $level = 2 to shorten it as follows:

1 year and 2 months

Remove the $lang part if you need it only in English or edit this translation to fit your needs:

$lang = array(
    'second' => 'Sekunde',
    'seconds' => 'Sekunden',
    'minute' => 'Minute',
    'minutes' => 'Minuten',
    'hour' => 'Stunde',
    'hours' => 'Stunden',
    'day' => 'Tag',
    'days' => 'Tage',
    'month' => 'Monat',
    'months' => 'Monate',
    'year' => 'Jahr',
    'years' => 'Jahre',
    'and' => 'und',
);

Answer 4

Slightly modified answer from above:

  $commentTime = strtotime($whatever)
  $today       = strtotime('today');
  $yesterday   = strtotime('yesterday');
  $todaysHours = strtotime('now') - strtotime('today');

private function timeElapsedString(
    $commentTime,
    $todaysHours,
    $today,
    $yesterday
) {
    $tokens = array(
        31536000 => 'year',
        2592000 => 'month',
        604800 => 'week',
        86400 => 'day',
        3600 => 'hour',
        60 => 'minute',
        1 => 'second'
    );
    $time = time() - $commentTime;
    $time = ($time < 1) ? 1 : $time;
    if ($commentTime >= $today || $commentTime < $yesterday) {
        foreach ($tokens as $unit => $text) {
            if ($time < $unit) {
                continue;
            }
            if ($text == 'day') {
                $numberOfUnits = floor(($time - $todaysHours) / $unit) + 1;
            } else {
                $numberOfUnits = floor(($time)/ $unit);
            }
            return $numberOfUnits . ' ' . $text . (($numberOfUnits > 1) ? 's' : '') . ' ago';
        }
    } else {
        return 'Yesterday';
    }
}

Answer 5

# This function prints the difference between two php datetime objects
# in a more human readable form
# inputs should be like strtotime($date)
function humanizeDateDiffference($now,$otherDate=null,$offset=null){
    if($otherDate != null){
        $offset = $now - $otherDate;
    }
    if($offset != null){
        $deltaS = $offset%60;
        $offset /= 60;
        $deltaM = $offset%60;
        $offset /= 60;
        $deltaH = $offset%24;
        $offset /= 24;
        $deltaD = ($offset > 1)?ceil($offset):$offset;      
    } else{
        throw new Exception("Must supply otherdate or offset (from now)");
    }
    if($deltaD > 1){
        if($deltaD > 365){
            $years = ceil($deltaD/365);
            if($years ==1){
                return "last year"; 
            } else{
                return "<br>$years years ago";
            }   
        }
        if($deltaD > 6){
            return date('d-M',strtotime("$deltaD days ago"));
        }       
        return "$deltaD days ago";
    }
    if($deltaD == 1){
        return "Yesterday";
    }
    if($deltaH == 1){
        return "last hour";
    }
    if($deltaM == 1){
        return "last minute";
    }
    if($deltaH > 0){
        return $deltaH." hours ago";
    }
    if($deltaM > 0){
        return $deltaM." minutes ago";
    }
    else{
        return "few seconds ago";
    }
}

Answer 6

Use of:

echo elapsed_time('2016-05-09 17:00:00'); // 18 saat 8 dakika önce yazıldı.

Function:

function elapsed_time($time){// Nekadar zaman geçmiş

        $diff = time() - strtotime($time); 

        $sec = $diff;
        $min = floor($diff/60);
        $hour = floor($diff/(60*60));
        $hour_min = floor($min - ($hour*60));
        $day = floor($diff/(60*60*24));
        $day_hour = floor($hour - ($day*24));
        $week = floor($diff/(60*60*24*7));
        $mon = floor($diff/(60*60*24*7*4));
        $year = floor($diff/(60*60*24*7*4*12));

        //difference calculate to string
        if($sec < (60*5)){
            return 'şimdi yazıldı.';
        }elseif($min < 60){
            return 'biraz önce yazıldı.';
        }elseif($hour < 24){
            return $hour.' saat '.$hour_min.' dakika önce yazıldı.';
        }elseif($day < 7){
            if($day_hour!=0){$day_hour=$day_hour.' saat ';}else{$day_hour='';}
            return $day.' gün '.$day_hour.'önce yazıldı.';
        }elseif($week < 4){
            return $week.' hafta önce yazıldı.';
        }elseif($mon < 12){
            return $mon.' ay önce yazıldı.';
        }else{
            return $year.' yıl önce yazıldı.';
        }
    }