My timestamp holy grail

One problem in calculating "1 day ago" is it's based on hours, not date. I think of days as calendar dates rather than strict 24 hours ago.

Another problem is while I like the narrative way of describing "ago", I still want to show the actual time, thus "about 3 hours ago at 4:31PM" suits me.

As we go further back in time, the amount of detail changes. Any date this year, don't need the year. Within the past week, say something like "Last Tuesday"

My algorithm:

If not the same year, show "dd-mmm-yyyy hh:mm" (full date and time, no day of week)

If today,

if <4 minutes, show "About xx minutes ago"

else if <4 hours ago, show "About xx [hours|minutes] ago at hh:mm"

else "Today at hh:mm"

if yesterday, show "Yesterday at hh:mm"

if 2 to 6 days ago, "Last [dayofweek], dd-mmm at hh:mm"

else "[dayofweek], dd-mmm hh:mm" (no year)

Here's some example output:

"less than a minute ago"

"about 42 minutes ago at 7:31PM"

"Today at 1:20PM"

"Yesterday at 7:31PM"

"Last Wed, 18-Jul at 7:31PM"

"Sat, 28-Jun at 7:31PM"

"28-Jul-2006 at 7:31PM"

Here's the helper code (btw, I left the timezone stuff in for spice)

  def smart_time_ago( was, is = TzTime.now )

    was = tz_convert( was )

    was = was.to_time if was.respond_to?(:to_time)

    is = tz_convert( is )

    if (was.year != is.year) # not this year

                    time = was.strftime("%d-%b-%Y %l:%M%p")

    else 

      case (is.yday - was.yday)

        when 0 # today           

          if (is - was < 4.minutes)

                    time = distance_of_time_in_words(was,is) + " ago" 

          elsif (is - was < 4.hours)

                    time = distance_of_time_in_words(was,is) + was.strftime(" ago at %l:%M%p")     

          else

                    time = was.strftime("Today at %l:%M%p")

          end

        when 1 # yesterday

                    time = was.strftime("Yesterday at %l:%M%p")

        when 2..6 # past week 

                    time = was.strftime("Last %a, %d-%b at %l:%M%p")

        else # this year

                    time = was.strftime("%a, %d-%b at %l:%M%p")

      end

    end

    return time.squeeze(' ')

  end