Is there a better way to do this? (Converting time units)

[Ethanthegrand14 (Ethanthegrand)]

Basically, i am trying to convert a time number (which is in secends) into a different unit of time.

For an example, seconds to days, or seconds to weeks, etc

if CommandAge < 60 then -- Check if under a minute
	AgeText = CommandAge .. " seconds ago"
elseif CommandAge < 3600 then -- Check if under an hour
	AgeText = math.floor(CommandAge / 60) .. " minutes ago"
elseif CommandAge < 86400 then -- If under a day
	AgeText = math.floor(CommandAge / 3600) .. " hours ago"
elseif CommandAge < 604800 then -- if under a week
	AgeText = math.floor(CommandAge / 86400) .. " days ago"
else
	AgeText = math.floor(CommandAge / 604800) .. " weeks ago"
end

This works, but is messy and kind of annoying to expand.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!

[DiscoDino01 (nullptr)]

I’d suggest using arrays i.e.

local CommandAge = 199929

local age_thresholds = {
	{threshold = 60, unit = "second", divisor = 1},
	{threshold = 3600, unit = "minute", divisor = 60},
	{threshold = 86400, unit = "hour", divisor = 3600},
	{threshold = 604800, unit = "day", divisor = 86400},
	{threshold = math.huge, unit = "week", divisor = 604800}
}

local ageText = ""
for _, v in ipairs(age_thresholds) do
	if CommandAge < v.threshold then
		local value = v.divisor and (CommandAge // v.divisor) or CommandAge
		ageText = string.format("%d %ss ago", value, v.unit)
		print(ageText)
		break
	end
end

[Ethanthegrand14 (Ethanthegrand)]

thats a lot neater i have to agree. Is it possible to maybe calculate either the divisors or the threshold values?

[DiscoDino01 (nullptr)]

Threshold:

for i = 1, #age_thresholds do
    age_thresholds[i].threshold = age_thresholds[i].divisor * 60    --threshold = divisor × 60
end

Divisor:

for i = 1, #age_thresholds do
    thresholds[i].divisor = thresholds[i].threshold / 60  -- divisor = threshold ÷ 60
end

[kingerman88]

The divisor should be the previous threshold (or 1)

You can’t really calculate it with a function since the thresholds / divisors are arbitrarily chosen values to fit time. (60 * 60 * 24 * 7 gives weeks)

Adapting the code @DiscoDino01 made gives something like this:

local CommandAge = 199929

local age_thresholds = {
	{threshold = 60, unit = "second"},
	{threshold = 3600, unit = "minute"},
	{threshold = 86400, unit = "hour"},
	{threshold = 604800, unit = "day"},
	{threshold = math.huge, unit = "week"}
}

local ageText = ""
for i, v in age_thresholds do
	if CommandAge >= v.threshold then continue end
	local divisor = age_thresholds[i-1] and age_thresholds[i-1].threshold or 1
	local value = CommandAge // divisor
	ageText = string.format("%d %ss ago", value, v.unit)
	print(ageText)
	break
end