Showing elapsed time in web views without using Today

If you use @today or @now function in view columns or selection formulas, it will result in noticable performance problem on server.

In Web environment, we have a powerful tool: javascript...

We will have a view with a field StartDateTime and we are going to show the time between now and StartDateTime.

Code is self-explanatory...

 <SCRIPT>
function showElapsed() {

// **************************************************************
//  Display elapsed time at the web client
//  (C) Serdar Basegmez
//  sbasegmez%yahoo.com   (anti-spam precaution :)))
// **************************************************************
// 1-->
// dateadjustment is a variable that needs to be computed at the top of form. It shows us the difference of server's now and browser's now. We
// avoid negative elapsed times with the variable. At the top of template of the view ($$View Template of XXX), place a computed-for-display 
// field with the following formula. This notation is used to avoid date format conflicts...
//
//    yr:=@Text(@Year(@Now));
//    mnt:=@Text(@Month(@Now)-1);
//    dy:=@Text(@Day(@Now));
//    hr:=@Text(@Hour(@Now));
//    mn:=@Text(@Minute(@Now));
//    sc:=@Text(@Second(@Now));
//    "[<SCRIPT>var dayAtServer=new Date("+yr+"," +mnt+ "," +dy+ "," + hr+ "," +mn + "," +sc+ "); 
//     var dateadjustment=((new Date())-dayAtServer)"+"</SCRIPT>]"

// 2 -->
// You should place a declaration in JS Header of template of the view:
//
// var dates=new Array();

// 3-->
// You should place a column in a view that has a formula: It creates div's with unique names. The code set inner html's of div's according to related
// member of dates array. You should beware of replication conflicts and response documents... I have excluding these documents in the view.
//
// ourdate:=StartDateTime;
// yr:=@Text(@Year(ourdate));
// mnt:=@Text(@Month(ourdate)-1);
// dy:=@Text(@Day(ourdate));
// hr:=@Text(@Hour(ourdate));
// mn:=@Text(@Minute(ourdate));
// sc:=@Text(@Second(ourdate));
// order:=@Text(@DocNumber(""));
//
// "[<div ID='ElapsedTime"+order+"'></DIV><SCRIPT>dates["+order+"]=new Date("+yr+"," +mnt+ "," +dy+ "," + hr+ "," +mn + "," +sc+ ");</SCRIPT>]"


var datenow=(new Date())-dateadjustment;  // computes date of the server.
var i=1;

while (dates[i]!=null)  // Loop until the last doc...
{
var elapsed=0;
elapsed=Math.floor((datenow-dates[i])/60000);  //compute elapsed time in minutes. This can be replaced... division by 1000 gives time in seconds.
showdt="";


if (elapsed>=1440) {
 showdt+=String(Math.floor(elapsed/1440))+"d:";   //compute # of days...
 elapsed=elapsed%1440;
}
if (elapsed>=60) {
 showdt+=String(Math.floor(elapsed/60))+"h:";   // compute # of hours
 elapsed=elapsed%60;
} 
if (elapsed!=0) {
 showdt+=String(Math.floor(elapsed))+"m";   //compute # of minutes
}

document.getElementById("ElapsedTime"+i).innerHTML = "<Center>"+showdt+"</Center>"; //place the element...
i++;
}

counter=setTimeout("showElapsed()",1000);  //I am using this command to refresh the elapsed times each second. I am not using it for large views.
}

</SCRIPT>

<SCRIPT>
showElapsed();   //initiate the function...
</SCRIPT>