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Rails Forum - Ruby on Rails Help and Discussion Forum » Controllers and Views » The Perfect Timestamp
Hi all,
I just wrote a little piece where I provide some Rails helpers that construct what I believe to be the Holy Grail of timestamps 
http://www.almosteffortless.com/2007/07 … timestamp/
Perhaps you'll find it informative and useful. Let me know if you have any feedback!
That's definetely the most interesting article on timestamps I've read. I've never heard anyone choosing which timestamp they'd take on a desert island with them 
.
Just a couple of suggestions. First, a lot the magic you're doing with strftime can be done more easily if you use DateTime's strftime (which is for some reason a lot more fully featured):
time.to_datetime.strftime "%a, %d %b %Y, %l:%M%P"
def time_ago_or_time_stamp(from_time, to_time = Time.now, include_seconds = true, detail = false)
[from_time, to_time].each {|t| t = t.to_time if t.respond_to?(:to_time)}
if (((to_time - from_time).abs)/60).round > 2880 && detail
return timestamp(from_time)
else
return distance_of_time_in_words(from_time, to_time, include_seconds)
end
end
Last edited by alexpt (2007-07-29 12:30:07)
Oooh. I'm going to switch over to that to_datetime - awesome. I had no idea there was a difference. How very odd.
Also, the distance_of_time_in_words helper wasn't quite the way I wanted it to be, so I decided to use that one instead. Honestly, I can't remember why I didn't like it now, though. I might give that a try as well.
Thanks for your response - very helpful!
[edit]
Alex, the strftime example you posted gives me a weird space when there's only 1 digit in the hour:
Sun, 29 Jul 2007, 11:52am
Sun, 29 Jul 2007, 7:52am
Last edited by trevorturk (2007-07-29 13:03:45)
You're right, that is funny. I don't know why that would be. You can always add:
.squeeze(" ")Alex
I like it!
* goes to update article *
[edit]
Oh, yeah - I remember why I didn't like the distance_of_time_in_words (http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/Acti … ml#M000574) helper. It returns pretty long strings in some cases, like "about 1 hour" or "less than a minute," which rubbed me the wrong way for some reason. I prefer a specific time, like "15 seconds" - but that's just me.
I've linked to this thread for other people who happen to come across my article, because I'm sure somebody will find your alternative using the distance_of_time_in_words alternative really useful. Thanks again for the help!
Last edited by trevorturk (2007-07-29 13:18:04)
5 freaking stars
I love it!
You could update:
'1 day ago' > 'yesterday'
'1 hour ago' > 'an hour ago'
'1 minute ago' > 'a minute ago'
AdamC, I think I might just do that!
Hi all,
I took this and expanded on it a little bit by teaching it to understand timestamps in the future, and in the past.
So you can get back timestamps like:
One day ago
or
One day from now
I took out the TimeZone ability since I am waiting for the official new Time zone code to move from edge rails to released. I might add it back in then, or please feel free to add it and send me a copy!
And I simplified it so that you only have to pass in your timestamp, and then there is an optional options hash where you can pass in a new base time to measure from (although I am not clear on a use case for this since measuring between two arbitrary dates, and then returning something like 'one day ago' doesn't really make sense. No?
Current options are:
:base_time
:show_time (whether to display the time in the result or not)
Oh, I also added a full set of Rspec tests for future and past times.
It can be all be found here for the grand total price of free:
Cheers,
Glenn