Timeago is a jQuery plugin that makes it easy to support automatically updating fuzzy
timestamps (e.g. "4 minutes ago" or "about 1 day ago"). <ahref="jquery.timeago.js">Download</a>, view
the examples, and enjoy.
</p>
<pclass="example">
You opened this page <abbrclass="loaded timeago">sometime before now <spanclass="help">(turn on javascript, loser)</span></abbr>. <spanclass="help">(This will update every minute. Wait for it.)</span>
As time passes, the timestamps will automatically update.
</p>
<h3>Why?</h3>
<p>Timeago was originally built for use with <ahref="http://yarp.com">Yarp.com</a> (coming soon) to timestamp comments.</p>
<ul>
<li>Because timeago can refresh automatically, you won't have timestamps dated "1 minute ago" even though the page was opened 10 minutes ago.</li>
<li>Because the fuzzy timestamps aren't calculated on the server, you can take full advantage of page caching in your web applications.</li>
<li>You get to use <ahref="http://microformats.org/">microformats</a> like the cool kids.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Who?</h3>
<p>
Timeago was built by <ahref="http://ryan.mcgeary.org">Ryan McGeary</a>
while standing on the shoulders of giants. John Resig wrote about
a <ahref="http://ejohn.org/blog/javascript-pretty-date/">similar
approach</a>. The verbiage was based on
the <tt>distance_of_time_in_words</tt> ActionView helper
in <ahref="http://rubyonrails.org">Ruby on Rails</a>.
</p>
<h3>When?</h3>
<pclass="last">
Timeago was conceived <abbrclass="timeago"title="2008-07-17T02:30:00-0500">on July 17, 2008</abbr>. <spanclass="help">(Yup, that's powered by timeago too)</span>