What are some best practices for updating and querying user status based on timestamps in PHP?

When updating and querying user status based on timestamps in PHP, it is important to ensure that the timestamps are properly handled and compared to determine the current status of the user. One best practice is to store timestamps in a standardized format like Unix timestamp for easier comparison. When querying user status, compare the current timestamp with the stored timestamp to determine if the user's status needs to be updated.

// Example code snippet for updating and querying user status based on timestamps

// Update user status based on timestamp
$currentTimestamp = time();
$userTimestamp = strtotime($user['last_activity']);

if ($currentTimestamp - $userTimestamp > 3600) {
    // User has been inactive for more than 1 hour, update status to inactive
    $user['status'] = 'inactive';
}

// Query user status based on timestamp
if ($currentTimestamp - $userTimestamp < 1800) {
    // User has been active in the last 30 minutes
    $user['status'] = 'active';
} else {
    // User has been inactive for more than 30 minutes
    $user['status'] = 'inactive';
}