getting time difference with string like "A minute ago" or "An hour ago" on Android

Question

i have this code in my PHP

function nicetime($date)
{
date_default_timezone_set("Asia/Taipei");
if(empty($date)) {
    return "No date provided";
}

$periods         = array("second", "minute", "hour", "day", "week", "month", "year", "decade");
$lengths         = array("60","60","24","7","4.35","12","10");

$now             = time();
$unix_date         = strtotime($date);

   // check validity of date
if(empty($unix_date)) {    
    return "Bad date";
}

// is it future date or past date
if($now > $unix_date) {    
    $difference     = $now - $unix_date;
    $tense         = "ago";

} else {
    $difference     = $unix_date - $now;
    $tense         = "from now";
}

for($j = 0; $difference >= $lengths[$j] && $j < count($lengths)-1; $j++) {
    $difference /= $lengths[$j];
}

$difference = round($difference);

if($difference != 1) {
    $periods[$j].= "s";
}

return "$difference $periods[$j] {$tense}";
}

but now i want to do the same but this time in my Android. im having trouble because the string mytime is from a database, in an SQL format.

String mytime = pref.getString("announcementtime" + count, null);

output of mytime:

2013-08-31 15:55:22

i want to convert it to:

23 minutes ago //something like this

please be aware of the default timezone and the DateTime = Now

Answer 1

Its all in the DateUtils class.

CharSequence getRelativeTimeSpanString (long time, long now, long minResolution);

gives you the difference between time and now in a format like:

54 seconds ago.

To use your date string you have to convert it into empoch time first:

String mytime = pref.getString("announcementtime" + count, null); 

// it comes out like this 2013-08-31 15:55:22 so adjust the date format
SimpleDateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss");
Date date = df.parse(str);
long epoch = date.getTime();

String timePassedString = getRelativeTimeSpanString (epoch, System.currentTimeMillis(), DateUtils.SECOND_IN_MILLIS);