function for converting unix timestamp to useful text

[zeropaid]

Hi all looking for a function that will take a unix timestamp and make a relative conversion to now. This is for comments and I was wondering if there is anything out there to convert to a timestamp like digg has, for example '3 minutes ago' or 'last month', rounding off to the nearest thing that makes sense. Anyone seen anything like this?

[nico_swd]

I wrote this some time ago.

function calc_date_diff($timestamp_past = false, $timestamp_future = false, $years = true, $months = true, $days = true, $hours = true, $mins = true, $secs = true)
{
// Use current time if parameter is FALSE.
if (!$timestamp_past) $timestamp_past = time();
if (!$timestamp_future) $timestamp_future = time();

// Attempt to convert strings to timestamp if necessary.
$timestamp_future = is_string($timestamp_future) ? strtotime($timestamp_future) : intval($timestamp_future);
$timestamp_past = is_string($timestamp_past) ? strtotime($timestamp_past) : intval($timestamp_past);

$diff = $timestamp_future - $timestamp_past;
$calc_times = array();
$timeleft = array();

// Prepare array, depending on the output we want to get.
if ($years) $calc_times[] = array('Year', 'Years', 31104000);
if ($months) $calc_times[] = array('Month', 'Months', 2592000);
if ($days) $calc_times[] = array('Day', 'Days', 86400);
if ($hours) $calc_times[] = array('Hour', 'Hours', 3600);
if ($mins) $calc_times[] = array('Minute', 'Minutes', 60);
if ($secs) $calc_times[] = array('Second', 'Seconds', 1);

foreach ($calc_times AS $timedata)
{
list($time_sing, $time_plur, $offset) = $timedata;

if ($diff >= $offset)
{
$left = floor($diff / $offset);
$diff -= ($left * $offset);
$timeleft[] = "{$left} ". ($left == 1 ? $time_sing : $time_plur);
}
}

return $timeleft ? ($timestamp_future > $timestamp_past ? null : '-') . implode(', ', $timeleft) : 0;
}