Yes, I had seen that. It looked very similar to Time::Duration except that it's based on DateTime.

Here's a script comparing Time::Duration, DateTime::Format::Human::Duration, and Time::Ago for various durations.

#!/usr/bin/env perl

use strict;
use warnings;
use lib 'lib';
use DateTime;
use DateTime::Format::Human::Duration;
use Time::Ago;
use Time::Duration;

my $hour  = 60 * 60;
my $day   = $hour * 24;
my $month = $day * 30;

my @durations = (
  0,
  38,
  60 * 4,
  $hour * 3.8,
  $month * 7,
  $month * 23,
  $month * 28,
);

my $class = 'Human::Duration';
foreach (@durations) {
  my $dt1 = DateTime->from_epoch(epoch => time - $_);
  my $dt2 = DateTime->from_epoch(epoch => time);

  my $diff = $dt2 - $dt1;

  print "Seconds: $_\n";

  printf "%-25s %s\n", '  Time::Ago', Time::Ago->in_words($diff);

  print "\n";

  my $class = '  Human::Duration';
  printf "%-25s %s\n", "$class #1",
    DateTime::Format::Human::Duration->new->format_duration($diff);

  printf "%-25s %s\n", "$class #2",
    DateTime::Format::Human::Duration->new->format_duration(
      $diff,
      units => [qw/ years months /],
    );

  printf "%-25s %s\n", "$class #3",
    DateTime::Format::Human::Duration->new->format_duration(
      $diff,
      precision => 'years',
    );

  print "\n";

  $class = '  Time::Duration';
  printf "%-25s %s\n", "$class #1", Time::Duration::ago($_);
  printf "%-25s %s\n", "$class #1", Time::Duration::ago($_, 1);

  print "\n\n";
}

[download]

Output:

Seconds: 0
  Time::Ago               less than a minute

  Human::Duration #1      no time
  Human::Duration #2      no time
  Human::Duration #3      no time

  Time::Duration #1       right now
  Time::Duration #2       right now


Seconds: 38
  Time::Ago               1 minute

  Human::Duration #1      38 seconds
  Human::Duration #2      no time
  Human::Duration #3      no time

  Time::Duration #1       38 seconds ago
  Time::Duration #2       38 seconds ago


Seconds: 240
  Time::Ago               4 minutes

  Human::Duration #1      4 minutes
  Human::Duration #2      no time
  Human::Duration #3      no time

  Time::Duration #1       4 minutes ago
  Time::Duration #2       4 minutes ago


Seconds: 13680
  Time::Ago               about 4 hours

  Human::Duration #1      3 hours and 48 minutes
  Human::Duration #2      no time
  Human::Duration #3      no time

  Time::Duration #1       3 hours and 48 minutes ago
  Time::Duration #2       4 hours ago


Seconds: 18144000
  Time::Ago               7 months

  Human::Duration #1      6 months, 4 weeks, and 1 day
  Human::Duration #2      6 months
  Human::Duration #3      no time

  Time::Duration #1       210 days ago
  Time::Duration #2       210 days ago


Seconds: 59616000
  Time::Ago               almost 2 years

  Human::Duration #1      1 year, 10 months, 3 weeks, and 1 day
  Human::Duration #2      1 year and 10 months
  Human::Duration #3      1 year

  Time::Duration #1       1 year and 325 days ago
  Time::Duration #2       2 years ago


Seconds: 72576000
  Time::Ago               over 2 years

  Human::Duration #1      2 years, 3 months, 2 weeks, and 5 days
  Human::Duration #2      2 years and 3 months
  Human::Duration #3      2 years

  Time::Duration #1       2 years and 110 days ago
  Time::Duration #2       2 years ago

[download]

You can see that Time::Ago is much more lax in it's approximation, always returning just a single, rounded unit.

The use-case for this is when precision is not especially important. e.g., for when a comment was made on a website, etc.

The latest version of T::A on github is now using Locale::TextDomain for localization, and support has been added for handling DateTime::Duration objects directly.

In reply to Re^2: Perl Time Ago in Words by mla12
in thread Perl Time Ago in Words by Anonymous Monk

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