title: getting time difference with string like "A minute ago" or "An hour ago" on Android
body: <p>i have this code in my PHP</p>
  
  <pre><code>function nicetime($date)
  {
  date_default_timezone_set("Asia/Taipei");
  if(empty($date)) {
      return "No date provided";
  }
  
  $periods         = array("second", "minute", "hour", "day", "week", "month", "year", "decade");
  $lengths         = array("60","60","24","7","4.35","12","10");
  
  $now             = time();
  $unix_date         = strtotime($date);
  
     // check validity of date
  if(empty($unix_date)) {    
      return "Bad date";
  }
  
  // is it future date or past date
  if($now &gt; $unix_date) {    
      $difference     = $now - $unix_date;
      $tense         = "ago";
  
  } else {
      $difference     = $unix_date - $now;
      $tense         = "from now";
  }
  
  for($j = 0; $difference &gt;= $lengths[$j] &amp;&amp; $j &lt; count($lengths)-1; $j++) {
      $difference /= $lengths[$j];
  }
  
  $difference = round($difference);
  
  if($difference != 1) {
      $periods[$j].= "s";
  }
  
  return "$difference $periods[$j] {$tense}";
  }
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>but now i want to do the same but this time in my Android.
  im having trouble because the string mytime is from a database, in an SQL format.</p>
  
  <pre><code>String mytime = pref.getString("announcementtime" + count, null);
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>output of mytime:</p>
  
  <pre><code>2013-08-31 15:55:22
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>i want to convert it to:</p>
  
  <pre><code>23 minutes ago //something like this
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>please be aware of the default timezone and the DateTime = Now</p>