diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 65f9332..557ca4b 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -340,6 +340,12 @@ Reveal.initialize({
 	// speaker view
 	defaultTiming: 120,
 
+	// Specify the total time in seconds that is available to
+	// present.  If this is set to a nonzero value, the pacing
+	// timer will work out the time available for each slide,
+	// instead of using the defaultTiming value
+	totalTime: 0,
+
 	// Enable slide navigation via mouse wheel
 	mouseWheel: false,
 
@@ -1228,7 +1234,7 @@ The speaker notes window will also show:
 - Current wall-clock time
 - (Optionally) a pacing timer which indicates whether the current pace of the presentation is on track for the right timing (shown in green), and if not, whether the presenter should speed up (shown in red) or has the luxury of slowing down (blue).
 
-The pacing timer can be enabled by configuring by the `defaultTiming` parameter in the `Reveal` configuration block, which specifies the number of seconds per slide.  120 can be a reasonable rule of thumb.  Timings can also be given per slide `<section>` by setting the `data-timing` attribute.  Both values are in numbers of seconds.
+The pacing timer can be enabled by configuring the `defaultTiming` parameter in the `Reveal` configuration block, which specifies the number of seconds per slide.  120 can be a reasonable rule of thumb.  Alternatively, you can enable the timer by setting `totalTime`, which sets the total length of your presentation (also in seconds).  If both values are specified, `totalTime` wins and `defaultTiming` is ignored.  Regardless of the baseline timing method, timings can also be given per slide `<section>` by setting the `data-timing` attribute (again, in seconds).
 
 
 ## Server Side Speaker Notes
diff --git a/plugin/notes/notes.html b/plugin/notes/notes.html
index 9e0b230..b5635bc 100644
--- a/plugin/notes/notes.html
+++ b/plugin/notes/notes.html
@@ -539,12 +539,16 @@
 
 					callRevealApi( 'getSlidesAttributes', [], function ( slideAttributes ) {
 						callRevealApi( 'getConfig', [], function ( config ) {
+							var totalTime = config.totalTime;
 							var defaultTiming = config.defaultTiming;
-							if (defaultTiming == null) {
+							if ((defaultTiming == null) && (totalTime == null)) {
 								callback(null);
 								return;
 							}
-
+							// Setting totalTime overrides defaultTiming
+							if (totalTime) {
+								defaultTiming = 0;
+							}
 							var timings = [];
 							for ( var i in slideAttributes ) {
 								var slide = slideAttributes[ i ];
@@ -559,7 +563,17 @@
 								}
 								timings.push(timing);
 							}
-
+							if ( totalTime ) {
+								// After we've allocated time to individual slides, we summarize it and
+								// subtract it from the total time
+								var remainingTime = totalTime - timings.reduce( function(a, b) { return a + b; }, 0 );
+								// The remaining time is divided by the number of slides that have 0 seconds
+								// allocated at the moment, giving the average time-per-slide on the remaining slides
+								var remainingSlides = (timings.filter( function(x) { return x == 0 }) ).length
+								var timePerSlide = Math.round( remainingTime / remainingSlides, 0 )
+								// And now we replace every zero-value timing with that average
+								timings = timings.map( function(x) { return (x==0 ? timePerSlide : x) } );
+							}
 							callback( timings );
 						} );
 					} );