Over on the StudioPress Community Forum a participant has asked, “Add reading time to Essence Pro without plugin.” The participant has provided a link to a blog post entitled, “How to Add Reading time in WordPress without using plugin” where the author has provided the necessary code to present the “Reading Time.” However, the participant is unable to implement the second code into his/her Genesis child theme:
<?php echo reading_time(); ?>
In the Genesis Framework you can easily add snippets like this by creating a shortcode.
Add the Reading Time Code
Modifying the code creates a “shortcode” to replace the above code. Add the following to your functions.php file.
https://gist.github.com/cre8tivediva/c000d15f39f0d87353da345fc8ca6f86
Configure Your Post Entry Meta
For most Genesis Child Themes you will add the code this way through the Customizer. **For Essence Pro, skip here and see instructions further below.
Go to Genesis > Theme Settings > Singular Content. Update the Entry Meta (above content) to include: Reading Time: 2 minutes, then Save. The reading time will then appear on your blog post similar to this.
Note: You can also output the Reading Time by adding it to the Entry Meta (below content).
Essence Pro Users
The Post Meta is hard coded in the functions.php file. You will need to add the shortcode to the existing snippet.
Around Line 438 of the functions file, you will need to add your shortcode this way – enter the highlighted content which includes the forward slash (/) before the text after the author link.
after=" /"] Reading Time: 2 minutes
You should see the Reading Time.
And that’s it!
