vague-time

vagueTime.js

A tiny JavaScript library that formats precise time differences as a vague/fuzzy time, e.g. '3 months ago', 'just now' or 'in 2 hours'.

If this project isn't quite what your'e looking for, you may be interested in vagueTime's big sister, vagueDate.js. Or if you would like to parse vague time strings rather than generate them, you should try Matthew Mueller's date or Tim Wood's moment.

License

MIT

Installation

Via NPM

npm install vague-time

Via Jam

jam install vague-time

Via Git

git clone [e-mail]:philbooth/vagueTime.js.git

Usage

Loading the library

Both CommonJS (e.g. if you're running on Node.js or if you're in the browser with Browserify) and AMD (e.g. if you're using Require.js) loading styles are supported. If neither system is detected, the library defaults to exporting it's interface globally as vagueTime.

Calling the library

vagueTime.js exports a single public function, get, which returns a vague time string based on the argument(s) that you pass it.

The arguments are passed as properties on a single options object. The optional property from is a timestamp or Date instance denoting the origin point from which the vague time will be calculated, defaulting to Date.now() if undefined. The optional property to is a timestamp or Date instance denoting the target point to which the vague time will be calculated, defaulting to Date.now() if undefined. The optional property units is a string, denoting the units that the from and to timestamps are specified in, either 's' for seconds or 'ms' for milliseconds, defaulting to 'ms' if undefined. This property has no effect when from and to are Date instances rather than timestamps.

Essentially, if to is less than from the returned vague time will indicate some point in the past. If to is greater than from it will indicate some point in the future.

Examples

vagueTime.get({
    from: 60,
    to: 0,
	units: 's'
}); // returns '1 minute ago'

vagueTime.get({
    from: 0,
    to: 60,
	units: 's'
}); // returns 'in 1 minute'

vagueTime.get({
    from: 7200,
    to: 0,
	units: 's'
}); // returns '2 hours ago'

vagueTime.get({
    from: 0,
    to: 7200,
	units: 's'
}); // returns 'in 2 hours'

vagueTime.get({
    from: new Date(2013, 0, 1)
	to: new Date(2012, 11, 31)
}); // returns '1 day ago'

Development

Dependencies

The build environment relies on Node.js, NPM, Jake, JSHint, Mocha, Chai and UglifyJS. Assuming that you already have Node.js and NPM set up, you just need to run npm install to install all of the dependencies as listed in package.json.

Unit tests

The unit tests are in test/vagueTime.js. You can run them with the command npm test or jake test. To run the tests in a web browser, open test/vagueTime.html.