Converting timestamp to time ago in PHP e.g 1 day ago, 2 days ago…

Answer 1

I am using following function for several years. And it is working fine:

function timeDifference($timestamp)
{
    $otherDate=$timestamp;
    $now=@date("Y-m-d H:i:s");

    $secondDifference=@strtotime($now)-@strtotime($otherDate);
    $extra="";
    if ($secondDifference == 2592000) { 
    // months 
    $difference = $secondDifference/2592000; 
    $difference = round($difference,0); 
    if ($difference>1) { $extra="s"; } 
    $difference = $difference." month".$extra." ago"; 
}else if($secondDifference > 2592000)
    {$difference=timestamp($timestamp);} 
elseif ($secondDifference >= 604800) { 
    // weeks 
    $difference = $secondDifference/604800; 
    $difference = round($difference,0); 
    if ($difference>1) { $extra="s"; } 
    $difference = $difference." week".$extra." ago"; 
} 
elseif ($secondDifference >= 86400) { 
    // days 
    $difference = $secondDifference/86400; 
    $difference = round($difference,0); 
    if ($difference>1) { $extra="s"; } 
    $difference = $difference." day".$extra." ago"; 
} 
elseif ($secondDifference >= 3600) { 
    // hours 

    $difference = $secondDifference/3600; 
    $difference = round($difference,0); 
    if ($difference>1) { $extra="s"; } 
    $difference = $difference." hour".$extra." ago"; 
} 
elseif ($secondDifference < 3600) { 
    // hours 
    // for seconds (less than minute)
    if($secondDifference<=60)
    {       
        if($secondDifference==0)
        {
            $secondDifference=1;
        }
        if ($secondDifference>1) { $extra="s"; }
        $difference = $secondDifference." second".$extra." ago"; 

    }
    else
    {

$difference = $secondDifference/60; 
        if ($difference>1) { $extra="s"; }else{$extra="";}
        $difference = round($difference,0); 
        $difference = $difference." minute".$extra." ago"; 
    }
} 

$FinalDifference = $difference; 
return $FinalDifference;
}

Answer 2

function time_elapsed_string($ptime)
{
    $etime = time() - $ptime;

    if ($etime < 1)
    {
        return '0 seconds';
    }

    $a = array( 365 * 24 * 60 * 60  =>  'year',
                 30 * 24 * 60 * 60  =>  'month',
                      24 * 60 * 60  =>  'day',
                           60 * 60  =>  'hour',
                                60  =>  'minute',
                                 1  =>  'second'
                );
    $a_plural = array( 'year'   => 'years',
                       'month'  => 'months',
                       'day'    => 'days',
                       'hour'   => 'hours',
                       'minute' => 'minutes',
                       'second' => 'seconds'
                );

    foreach ($a as $secs => $str)
    {
        $d = $etime / $secs;
        if ($d >= 1)
        {
            $r = round($d);
            return $r . ' ' . ($r > 1 ? $a_plural[$str] : $str) . ' ago';
        }
    }
}

Answer 3

You'll have to take each individual piece of your timestamp, and convert it into Unix time. For example for the timestamp, 2009-09-12 20:57:19.

(((2008-1970)*365)+(8*30)+12)*24+20 would give you a ROUGH estimate of the hours since January 1st, 1970.

Take that number, multiply by 60 and add 57 to get the minutes.

Take that, multiply by 60 and add 19.

That would convert it very roughly and inaccurately however.

Is there any reason you can't just take the normal Unix time to begin with?

Answer 4

There is some issue with some language display time ago for example in Arabic there 3 needed formats to display date. I use this functions in my projects hopefully they can help someone (any suggestion or improvement I'll be apperciate :) )

/**
 *
 * @param   string $date1 
 * @param   string $date2 the date that you want to compare with $date1
 * @param   int $level  
 * @param   bool $absolute  
 */

function app_date_diff( $date1, $date2, $level = 3, $absolute = false ) {

    $date1 = date_create($date1);   
    $date2 = date_create($date2);
    $diff = date_diff( $date1, $date2, $absolute );

    $d = [
        'invert' => $diff->invert
    ];  

    $diffs = [
        'y' => $diff->y, 
        'm' => $diff->m, 
        'd' => $diff->d
    ];

    $level_reached = 0;

    foreach($diffs as $k=>$v) {

        if($level_reached >= $level) {
            break;
        }

        if($v > 0) {
            $d[$k] = $v;
            $level_reached++;
        }

    }

    return  $d;

}

/**
 * 
 */

function date_timestring( $periods, $format = 'latin', $separator = ',' ) {

    $formats = [
        'latin' => [
            'y' => ['year','years'],
            'm' => ['month','months'],
            'd' => ['day','days']
        ],
        'arabic' => [
            'y' => ['سنة','سنتين','سنوات'],
            'm' => ['شهر','شهرين','شهور'],
            'd' => ['يوم','يومين','أيام']
        ]
    ];

    $formats = $formats[$format];

    $string = [];

    foreach($periods as $period=>$value) {

        if(!isset($formats[$period])) {
            continue;
        }

        $string[$period] = $value.' ';
        if($format == 'arabic') {
            if($value == 2) {
                $string[$period] = $formats[$period][1];
            }elseif($value > 2 && $value <= 10) {
                $string[$period] .= $formats[$period][2];
            }else{
                $string[$period] .= $formats[$period][0];
            }

        }elseif($format == 'latin') {
            $string[$period] .= ($value > 1) ? $formats[$period][1] : $formats[$period][0];
        }

    }

    return implode($separator, $string);


}

function timeago( $date ) {

    $today = date('Y-m-d h:i:s');

    $diff = app_date_diff($date,$today,2);

    if($diff['invert'] == 1) {
        return '';
    }

    unset($diff[0]);

    $date_timestring = date_timestring($diff,'latin');

    return 'About '.$date_timestring;

}

$date1 = date('Y-m-d');
$date2 = '2018-05-14';

$diff = timeago($date2);
echo $diff;

Answer 5

Use example :

echo time_elapsed_string('2013-05-01 00:22:35');
echo time_elapsed_string('@1367367755'); # timestamp input
echo time_elapsed_string('2013-05-01 00:22:35', true);

Input can be any supported date and time format.

Output :

4 months ago
4 months ago
4 months, 2 weeks, 3 days, 1 hour, 49 minutes, 15 seconds ago

Function :

function time_elapsed_string($datetime, $full = false) {
    $now = new DateTime;
    $ago = new DateTime($datetime);
    $diff = $now->diff($ago);

    $diff->w = floor($diff->d / 7);
    $diff->d -= $diff->w * 7;

    $string = array(
        'y' => 'year',
        'm' => 'month',
        'w' => 'week',
        'd' => 'day',
        'h' => 'hour',
        'i' => 'minute',
        's' => 'second',
    );
    foreach ($string as $k => &$v) {
        if ($diff->$k) {
            $v = $diff->$k . ' ' . $v . ($diff->$k > 1 ? 's' : '');
        } else {
            unset($string[$k]);
        }
    }

    if (!$full) $string = array_slice($string, 0, 1);
    return $string ? implode(', ', $string) . ' ago' : 'just now';
}

Answer 6

function humanTiming ($time)
        {

            $time = time() - $time; // to get the time since that moment
            $time = ($time<1)? 1 : $time;
            $tokens = array (
                31536000 => 'year',
                2592000 => 'month',
                604800 => 'week',
                86400 => 'day',
                3600 => 'hour',
                60 => 'minute',
                1 => 'second'
            );

            foreach ($tokens as $unit => $text) {
                if ($time < $unit) continue;
                $numberOfUnits = floor($time / $unit);
                return $numberOfUnits.' '.$text.(($numberOfUnits>1)?'s':'');
            }

        }

echo humanTiming( strtotime($mytimestring) );