relative dates?

[eluser]Michael Wales[/eluser]
I don't think it need to be configurable... just common "sensical"

For the typical uses of this function:
1. Anything less than 5 minutes doesn't matter - just now will suffice.
2. Hours/Minutes don't matter, once you hit days.
3. Days don't matter once you hit months
4. Months don't matter once you hit years.

Don't get me wrong - I've generalized the function quite a bit. But really, this is almost always used for "posted ago" type situations, as a quick reference.

We'll take BambooInvoice for example (although I have limited experience with it). Let's say we have a page with overdue invoices...

000 Company Name More than 2 years overdue
001 Company Name More than 1 year overdue
002 Company Name 6 months overdue
003 Company Name 3 days overdue

Compared to (if we didn't generalize so much and just used years, months, days (which is still better than how timespan is now):

000 Company Name 2 years, 4 months, 10 days overdue
001 Company Name 1 year, 1 month, 26 days overdue
002 Company Name 6 months, 4 days overdue
003 Company Name 3 days overdue

Another example, a forum/blog:

Posted more than 1 year ago
Posted 3 months ago
Posted 8 days ago
Posted just now

I think what it really comes down to - this is used for quick perception of a timeframe. Nothing legitimate, nothing you would base math off of - just a mental reference. As time goes on, the amount of detail in which you care about decreases.

If I'm invoicing someone do I really care they are 1 year, 6 months late (as opposed to more than 1 year)? Probably not - they are hella-late and I am taking them to small claims court regardless.

I'm not saying this is the end-all solution, but I believe it's a definite improvement. Some rounding could be involved as well:
1 year, 8 months = almost 2 years
3 months, 27 days = almost 4 months
etc.