Adding View Count Statistics to the TangStyle Theme

The Xiaoz Blog uses the TangStyle theme. As noted by the theme author, Tang Jie, this theme does not natively support article view statistics and typically requires an additional plugin.

While installing too many plugins may impact site speed, a solution found on another blog allows for view counting via code. This method is shared here, though it may not be compatible with all themes.

To implement this, add the following code to the functions.php file in your theme directory:

/* Visit Counter */
function record_visitors()
{
	if (is_singular())
	{
	  global $post;
	  $post_ID = $post->ID;
	  if($post_ID)
	  {
		  $post_views = (int)get_post_meta($post_ID, 'views', true);
		  if(!update_post_meta($post_ID, 'views', ($post_views+1)))
		  {
			add_post_meta($post_ID, 'views', 1, true);
		  }
	  }
	}
}
add_action('wp_head', 'record_visitors');

function post_views($before = '(Click ', $after = ' times)', $echo = 1)
{
  global $post;
  $post_ID = $post->ID;
  $views = (int)get_post_meta($post_ID, 'views', true);
  if ($echo) echo $before, number_format($views), $after;
  else return $views;
}

Next, locate the single.php and index.php files in your theme directory. Find the following code:

<?php if(function_exists(the_views)) { the_views('views', true);}?>

Replace it with:

Views: <?php post_views(' ', ' times'); ?>

After some time, you will be able to see the view counts displayed on your posts:

This article references the blog of "I Only Care About You": http://www.laipingtan.com/archives/208