*Problem* Functions that convert or work with time units, i.e. `System.convert_time_unit/1`, `DateTime.add/3` and `Time.add/3` are limited to working with a subset of possible time units. The current subset of *named units* includes `:second`, `:millisecond`, `:microsecond`, and `:nanosecond`. It is extremely common to manipulate dates and times by larger units such as minutes, hours or days. Currently we have to convert any values to seconds and then use that to change the value, which isn't particularly explicit or expressive. For example, to get the date for one week from now I need to write:
DateTime.add(DateTime.utc_now(), 7 * 24 * 60 * 60, :second) *Proposal* I propose the addition of larger pre-defined units to make conversion more expressive. Units could include some or all of the following: - `:minute` - `:hour` - `:day` - `:week` Some larger units such as `month` or `year` are not fixed or standard units and could be omitted. This enables more expressive time calculations such as "one hour from now", "one day from now", etc.: utc_now = DateTime.utc_now() DateTime.add(utc_now, 30, :minute) DateTime.add(utc_now, 1, :hour) DateTime.add(utc_now, 1, :day) In my experience it is extremely common to find module attributes or variables that declar a unit of time to make larger values comprehensible. It is much clearer to specify `1, :day` instead of `@one_day_in_seconds, :second` or something similar. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "elixir-lang-core" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to elixir-lang-core+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elixir-lang-core/7ca22377-aadc-4e5b-a57f-ad0c52fc5ba8%40googlegroups.com.
