像这样的东西是可行的。

def relative_time(start_time)
  diff_seconds = Time.now - start_time
  case diff_seconds
    when 0 .. 59
      puts "#{diff_seconds} seconds ago"
    when 60 .. (3600-1)
      puts "#{diff_seconds/60} minutes ago"
    when 3600 .. (3600*24-1)
      puts "#{diff_seconds/3600} hours ago"
    when (3600*24) .. (3600*24*30) 
      puts "#{diff_seconds/(3600*24)} days ago"
    else
      puts start_time.strftime("%m/%d/%Y")
  end
end

听起来好像您正在从ActiveSupport中寻找time_ago_in_words方法(或distance_of_time_in_words)。这样叫它:

<%= time_ago_in_words(timestamp) %>

因为这里的大多数答案建议time_ago_in_words。

而不是使用:

<%= time_ago_in_words(comment.created_at) %>

在Rails中，首选:

<abbr class="timeago" title="<%= comment.created_at.getutc.iso8601 %>">
  <%= comment.created_at.to_s %>
</abbr>

连同jQuery库http://timeago.yarp.com/，与代码:

$("abbr.timeago").timeago();

主要优势:缓存

http://rails-bestpractices.com/posts/2012/02/10/not-use-time_ago_in_words/

是什么

30.seconds.ago
2.days.ago

还是你的其他目的?

看看这里的实例方法:

http://apidock.com/rails/Time

它有一些有用的方法，如昨天，明天，beginning_of_week, ago等。

例子:

Time.now.yesterday
Time.now.ago(2.days).end_of_day
Time.now.next_month.beginning_of_month

我已经写了这个，但是必须检查现有的方法，看看它们是否更好。

module PrettyDate
  def to_pretty
    a = (Time.now-self).to_i

    case a
      when 0 then 'just now'
      when 1 then 'a second ago'
      when 2..59 then a.to_s+' seconds ago' 
      when 60..119 then 'a minute ago' #120 = 2 minutes
      when 120..3540 then (a/60).to_i.to_s+' minutes ago'
      when 3541..7100 then 'an hour ago' # 3600 = 1 hour
      when 7101..82800 then ((a+99)/3600).to_i.to_s+' hours ago' 
      when 82801..172000 then 'a day ago' # 86400 = 1 day
      when 172001..518400 then ((a+800)/(60*60*24)).to_i.to_s+' days ago'
      when 518400..1036800 then 'a week ago'
      else ((a+180000)/(60*60*24*7)).to_i.to_s+' weeks ago'
    end
  end
end

Time.send :include, PrettyDate