Code for parsing a relative twitter date

ParseRelativeDate.java

// getRelativeTimeAgo("Mon Apr 01 21:16:23 +0000 2014");
public String getRelativeTimeAgo(String rawJsonDate) {
	String twitterFormat = "EEE MMM dd HH:mm:ss ZZZZZ yyyy";
	SimpleDateFormat sf = new SimpleDateFormat(twitterFormat, Locale.ENGLISH);
	sf.setLenient(true);

	String relativeDate = "";
	try {
		long dateMillis = sf.parse(rawJsonDate).getTime();
		relativeDate = DateUtils.getRelativeTimeSpanString(dateMillis,
				System.currentTimeMillis(), DateUtils.SECOND_IN_MILLIS).toString();
	} catch (ParseException e) {
		e.printStackTrace();
	}

	return relativeDate;
}

Consider adding the "DateUtils.FORMAT_ABBREV_RELATIVE" flag to abbreviate "minutes ago" to "min. ago".

Or, to use abbreviations like "5m" and "3d" instead of "5 minutes ago" and "3 days ago", check this out:

private static final int SECOND_MILLIS = 1000;
private static final int MINUTE_MILLIS = 60 * SECOND_MILLIS;
private static final int HOUR_MILLIS = 60 * MINUTE_MILLIS;
private static final int DAY_MILLIS = 24 * HOUR_MILLIS;

public String getRelativeTimeAgo(String rawJsonDate) {
    String twitterFormat = "EEE MMM dd HH:mm:ss ZZZZZ yyyy";
    SimpleDateFormat sf = new SimpleDateFormat(twitterFormat, Locale.ENGLISH);
    sf.setLenient(true);

    try {
        long time = sf.parse(rawJsonDate).getTime();
        long now = System.currentTimeMillis();

        final long diff = now - time;
        if (diff < MINUTE_MILLIS) {
            return "just now";
        } else if (diff < 2 * MINUTE_MILLIS) {
            return "a minute ago";
        } else if (diff < 50 * MINUTE_MILLIS) {
            return diff / MINUTE_MILLIS + " m";
        } else if (diff < 90 * MINUTE_MILLIS) {
            return "an hour ago";
        } else if (diff < 24 * HOUR_MILLIS) {
            return diff / HOUR_MILLIS + " h";
        } else if (diff < 48 * HOUR_MILLIS) {
            return "yesterday";
        } else {
            return diff / DAY_MILLIS + " d";
        }
    } catch (ParseException e) {
        Log.i(TAG, "getRelativeTimeAgo failed");
        e.printStackTrace();
    }

    return "";
}