SQL Server FAQ - PHP ODBC - Computing Date and Time Differences

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By: FYIcenter.com

PHP ODBC - How To Display a Past Time in Days, Hours and Minutes?

You have seen a lots of Websites are displaying past times in days, hours and minutes. If you want to do this yourself, you can use the DATEDIFF() SQL function The following tutorial exercise shows you how to use DATEDIFF() to present a past time in days, hours, and minutes:

<?php
  $con = odbc_connect('FYI_SQL_SERVER','sa','FYIcenter');

  $submit_time = "2007-05-29 04:09:49";
  $sql = "SELECT 'Posted '"
    . " + CONVERT(VARCHAR(40)," 
    . " DATEDIFF(minute, '$submit_time'," 
    . " GETDATE())/(24*60))"
    . " + ' days, '"
    . " + CONVERT(VARCHAR(40),"
    . " DATEDIFF(minute, '$submit_time',"
    . " GETDATE())%(24*60)/60)"
    . " + ' hours, and '"
    . " + CONVERT(VARCHAR(40)," 
    . " DATEDIFF(minute, '$submit_time',"
    . " GETDATE())%60)"
    . " + ' minutes ago.'";
  print("\n$sql\n");

  $res = odbc_exec($con, $sql);
  if (!$res) {
    print("SQL statement failed with error:\n");
    print(odbc_error($con).": ".odbc_errormsg($con)."\n");
  } else {
    odbc_fetch_row($res);
    $message = odbc_result($res, 1);
    print("\n$message\n");
  }

  odbc_close($con);

If today is you run this script, you will get something like this:

SELECT 'Posted ' + CONVERT(VARCHAR(40), 
DATEDIFF(minute, '2007-05-29 04:09:49', 
GETDATE())/(24*60))
+ ' days, ' + CONVERT(VARCHAR(40),  
DATEDIFF(minute, '2007-05-29 04:09:49', 
GETDATE())%(24*60)/60) 
+ ' hours, and ' + CONVERT(VARCHAR(40),
DATEDIFF(minute, '2007-05-29 04:09:49', 
GETDATE())%60) 
+ ' minutes ago.'

Posted 26 days, 16 hours, and 15 minutes ago.

(Continued on next topic...)