rails-timeago provides a timeago_tag helper to create time tags usable for jQuery Timeago plugin.

Add this line to your Gemfile:

gem 'rails-timeago', '~> 2.0'

And then execute:

$ bundle

Or install it yourself as:

$ gem install rails-timeago

Note: The bundled JavaScript can only be used with sprockets. Rails-webpacker cannot load scripts bundled with the gem. If you use rails-webpacker you need to install, load, and setup jquery-timeago on your own.

To use bundled jQuery Timeago plugin add this require statement to your application.js file:

//= require rails-timeago

This will also convert all matching time tags on page load.

Use the following to also include all available locale files:

//= require rails-timeago-all

If using a recent Rails with rails-ujs, jQuery might not be present anymore. You need to add jquery-rails to your Gemfile and load it, e.g.:

//= require jquery
//= require rails-timeago
//= require rails-timeago-all

Use the timeago_tag helper like any other regular tag helper:

<%= timeago_tag Time.zone.now limit: 10.days.ago %>

date_only Only print date as tag content instead of full time. (default: true)

format A time format for localize method used to format static time. (default: default)

limit Set a limit for time ago tags. All dates before given limit will not be converted. (default: 4.days.ago)

force Force time ago tag ignoring limit option. (default: false)

default String that will be returned if time is nil. (default: '-')

title A string or block that will be used to create a title attribute for timeago tags. It set to nil or false no title attribute will be set. (default: proc { |time, options| I18n.l time, format: options[:format] })

All other options will be given as options to the time tag helper. The above options can be assigned globally as defaults using

Rails::Timeago.default_options limit: proc { 20.days.ago }

A global limit should always be given as a block that will be evaluated each time the rails timeago_tag helper is called. That avoids the limit becoming smaller the longer the application runs.

rails-timeago 2 ships with a modified version of jQuery timeago that allows to include all locale files at once and set the locale via an option or per element via the lang attribute:

<%= timeago_tag Time.zone.now, lang: :de %>

The following snippet will print a script tag that set the jQuery timeago locale according to your I18n.locale:

<%= timeago_script_tag %>

Just insert it in your application layout's html head. If you use another I18n framework for JavaScript you can also directly set jQuery.timeago.settings.lang. For example:

jQuery.timeago.settings.lang = $('html').attr('lang')

Do not forget to require the needed locale files by either require rails-timeago-all in your application.js file or require specific locale files:

//= require locales/jquery.timeago.de.js
//= require locales/jquery.timeago.ru.js

Note: English is included in jQuery timeago library, but can be easily override by include an own file that defines jQuery.timeago.settings.strings["en"]. See a locale file for more details.

rails-timeago includes locale files for the following locales taken from jQuery Timeago.

Your customized jQuery locale files must be changed to work with rails-timeago 2. Instead of defining your locale strings as jQuery.timeago.settings.strings you need to define them like this:

jQuery.timeago.settings.strings["en"] = {
    ...
}

MIT License

Copyright (c) 2014, Jan Graichen