i-n-g-m-a-r
Should DateTime.diff/3 round numbers?
I noticed some weird anomalies in a dataset.
Turns out I was mixing Postgres and Elixir numbers.
DateTime.diff(~U[2026-03-18 05:50:08.653909Z], ~U[2026-03-18 05:50:04.655608Z], :second)
# 3
DateTime.diff(~U[2026-03-18 05:50:08.653909Z], ~U[2026-03-18 05:50:04.655608Z], :millisecond)
# 3998
select extract(epoch from ('2026-03-18 05:50:08.653909Z'::timestamptz - '2026-03-18 05:50:04.655608Z'::timestamptz))::integer
# 4
The Postgres number (4) seems reasonable.
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LostKobrakai
The docs for DateTime.diff state the current behaviour:
Fractional results are not supported and are truncated.
You could always implement your own rounding or propose adding an option to DateTime.diff, but changing the default behaviour would be a breaking change.
LostKobrakai
Truncate is a common name used for that operation, e.g. on Kernel — Elixir v1.19.5. While it matches the rounding-towards-zero rounding strategy (one of many) it tries to tell that no rounding is happening. It’s not looking a the fractional remain to determine what needs to happen, but it ignores it outright of it is calculated in the first place.
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