Here’s the code:

/*
 * Takes a unix timestamp and returns a relative time string such as "3 minutes ago",
 *   "2 months from now", "1 year ago", etc
 * The detailLevel parameter indicates the amount of detail. The examples above are
 * with detail level 1. With detail level 2, the output might be like "3 minutes 20
 *   seconds ago", "2 years 1 month from now", etc.
 * With detail level 3, the output might be like "5 hours 3 minutes 20 seconds ago",
 *   "2 years 1 month 2 weeks from now", etc.
 */
function nicetime($timestamp, $detailLevel = 1) {

	$periods = array("second", "minute", "hour", "day", "week", "month", "year", "decade");
	$lengths = array("60", "60", "24", "7", "4.35", "12", "10");

	$now = time();

	// check validity of date
	if(empty($timestamp)) {
		return "Unknown time";
	}

	// is it future date or past date
	if($now > $timestamp) {
		$difference = $now - $timestamp;
		$tense = "ago";

	} else {
		$difference = $timestamp - $now;
		$tense = "from now";
	}

	if ($difference == 0) {
		return "1 second ago";
	}

	$remainders = array();

	for($j = 0; $j < count($lengths); $j++) {
		$remainders[$j] = floor(fmod($difference, $lengths[$j]));
		$difference = floor($difference / $lengths[$j]);
	}

	$difference = round($difference);

	$remainders[] = $difference;

	$string = "";

	for ($i = count($remainders) - 1; $i >= 0; $i--) {
		if ($remainders[$i]) {
			$string .= $remainders[$i] . " " . $periods[$i];

			if($remainders[$i] != 1) {
				$string .= "s";
			}

			$string .= " ";

			$detailLevel--;

			if ($detailLevel <= 0) {
				break;
			}
		}
	}

	return $string . $tense;

}

And some examples:

echo nicetime(time());

The result would be “1 second ago”

echo nicetime(time() - 839283);

The result would be “1 week ago”

echo nicetime(time() - 8392783);

The result would be “3 months ago”

echo nicetime(time() - 8392783, 3);

The result would be “3 months 1 week 6 days ago”

echo nicetime(time() - 83592783, 3);

The result would be “2 years 7 months 2 weeks ago”

echo nicetime(time() - 83592783, 5);

The result would be “2 years 7 months 2 weeks 1 day 12 hours ago”

echo nicetime(time() + 90532, 5);

The result would be “1 day 1 hour 8 minutes 52 seconds from now”

No related posts.