php function to convert Unix timestamp into minutes or hours or days like digg?

Question

i want a php function to convert a unix time stamp to like this:

15 seconds

or

45 minutes

or

3 hours

and not like this : 2sec

Answer 1

Try this:

function toFriendlyTime($seconds) {
  $measures = array(
    'day'=>24*60*60,
    'hour'=>60*60,
    'minute'=>60,
    'second'=>1,
    );
  foreach ($measures as $label=>$amount) {
    if ($seconds >= $amount) {  
      $howMany = floor($seconds / $amount);
      return $howMany." ".$label.($howMany > 1 ? "s" : "");
    }
  } 
  return "now";
}   

As you can see, it's also flexible for adding/removing measures of time as you see fit. Just be sure to order the measures from largest to smallest. A test:

print(                           
    toFriendlyTime(0)."\n"           
    .toFriendlyTime(1)."\n"          
    .toFriendlyTime(2)."\n"          
    .toFriendlyTime(60)."\n"         
    .toFriendlyTime(3600)."\n"   
    .toFriendlyTime(24*3600)."\n"                                               
    );

Results in:

now
1 second
2 seconds
1 minute
1 hour
1 day