Jami Ryan ([EMAIL PROTECTED]):
> I know this is probably a dumb question, but I've been instructed to ask > it. In regards to the user report and allowing it to "cheat" and use > cookies instead of authenticated users, what happens if a log file line > doesn't contain a cookie? My guess is that Analog ignores it and only > counts those lines which do have cookies in them and only includes these > lines in it's not listed users total. Is this a correct assumption? Yes. If you have any USERINCLUDE or USEREXCLUDE statements then it will filter those lines, otherwise it will count them in other reports but not include them in the User Report. > Also, having read over your help files and web site, I know that is > impossible to count unique visitors and am aware that analog does not do > this. The problem I am having is the head of the web site I'm working on > wants a figure for unique visitors regardless if it is impossible or > not. And, unfortunately, in another web site he is in charge of, it used > Analog's user report as a way to count unique visitors. He now is looking > to do the same thing on his new site. Which leads to my second question, > in using cookies instead of authenticated users for the user report, is > there a danger in allowing him to continue to use the figure of users not > listed as the number of "unique" visitors to his site? Depends on what you are counting and what you expect from it. If the cookies are persistent (expire in 2032 or something, NOT apache's mod_usertrack or other session-only cookies) then you'll get something like unique visitors. It won't be perfect, may not even be accurate. If your site has a highly technically inclined audience, then you are likely to have lots of users not accepting cookies. If your site is more main-stream, you will likely have more visitors with cookies. If your visitors are college students, then you are more likely counting unique computers in the college computer labs than unique visitors, etc. Nonetheless, you can use it as a metric of change. When compared to the same numbers gathered with the same technique in different time periods you can use it to determine trends. "Our persistent cookie count increased 20% in the last three month, so it may increase the same amount in the next quarter." Comparing the count on this site to the other site is going to be less useful unless you are fairly certain that they are targeting the same audience of visitors. Using this to compare to some other software package's 'unique visitor' count is totally useless. -- Jeremy Wadsack Wadsack-Allen Digital Group +------------------------------------------------------------------------ | This is the analog-help mailing list. To unsubscribe from this | mailing list, go to | http://lists.isite.net/listgate/analog-help/unsubscribe.html | | List archives are available at | http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ | http://lists.isite.net/listgate/analog-help/archives/ | http://www.tallylist.com/archives/index.cfm/mlist.7 +------------------------------------------------------------------------
