Should I store the result of an function into an array? - php

Question

I have a function like this:
function time_elapsed_string($ptime)
{
$date_time = strtotime("1348-10-10 04:30:01") + $ptime;
$year = date("Y",$date_time);
$month = date("m",$date_time);
$day = date("d",$date_time);
$time = date("H:i:s",$date_time);
$etime = time() - $ptime + 1;
$a = array( 31536000 => 'year',
2592000 => 'month',
86400 => 'day',
3600 => 'hour',
60 => 'minute',
1 => 'second'
);
foreach ($a as $secs => $str)
{
$d = $etime / $secs;
if ($d >= 1)
{
$r = round($d);
// EX:
return array('date' => $day.'-'.$month.'-'.$year, // 2016-02-20
'time' => $time, // 03:30:04
'difference' => $r . ' ' . $str . ' ago' // 2 month ago
);
}
}
}
And I use it like this:
$ptime = 1470692661;
$html = '<span title="date: '.time_elapsed_string($ptime)['date'].' time: '.time_elapsed_string($ptime)['time'].'">in '.time_elapsed_string($ptime)['difference'].'<span>';
As you see, I'm using of that function's result like this:
time_elapsed_string($ptime)['date']
ime_elapsed_string($ptime)['time']
time_elapsed_string($ptime)['difference']
In fact I'm calling that function every time I need one of its results. Is that right? Or should I call it once and store it into an array?
Note: My code works as well.

Answer 1

Counting time elapsed since some date/time like this is mauvais ton.
DateTime has been available since PHP 5.2.0 and tonns of people underestimate it. Why don't you use this instead of loops and ifs?
$create_time = "2016-08-02 12:35:04";
$current_time="2016-08-02 16:16:02";
$dtCurrent = DateTime::createFromFormat('Y-m-d H:i:s', $current_time);
// to use current timestamp, use the following:
//$dtCurrent = new DateTime();
$dtCreate = DateTime::createFromFormat('Y-m-d H:i:s', $create_time);
$diff = $dtCurrent->diff($dtCreate);
Now, you can format the result however you want:
$interval = $diff->format("%h hours %i minutes %s seconds");
This will give a clean 3 hours 40 minutes 58 seconds without any arrays, which is better.
UPDATE
There is a general solution to get hours / minutes / seconds via regex:
$interval = $diff->format("%y years %m months %d days %h hours %i minutes %s seconds");
// now remove zero values
$interval = preg_replace('/(^0| 0) (years|months|days|hours|minutes|seconds)/', '', $interval);
UPDATE 2
As of your comment:
Look, I want to use your approach .. but I really cannot implement it .. Actually I need three things: time, date, difference ..! But your approach doesn't give me them..
Well, we already know how to get the difference, it's the $interval variable described above.
To get time and date, you can get it from the $dtCreate variable by, again, using format:
$time = $dtCreate->format('H:i:s');
$date = $dtCreate->format('d-m-Y');

Answer 2

This is a no brainer.
Yes - store the function call result of time_elapsed_string($ptime) in an array, then use that to access your results. You're wasting CPU cycles otherwise!
// call it once
$result = time_elapsed_string($ptime);
// then use:
$result['date'];
$result['time'];
$result['difference'];