Log File Alternatives

Need some good information

[AndAgain]

I tried to get this answered in another post unsuccessfully...so here goes again.

What are all the options one has when conerning logging website visitor traffic?

Please and Thank you,
AndAgain

[cgrantski]

I'm not sure what you mean, can you explain more?

[larryn]

AndAgain,

Using standard web logs, you can automatically get basic information: visitor IP, date, time, login, request URL, size, status.

However, most servers allow you to collect more information, including the referring URL and the agent (browser). And some even go further, allowing you to collect session ID, cookies, and server stats.

Finally, if you enhance your site for metrics, you can then get even further information.

Perhaps if you could tell us what types of servers you are using you might be better information.

Larry

[AndAgain]

Some sites are on unix, some linux and some windows. The traffic application will be on a windows box. Yeah thanks for the reply I am looking for anything that will help this get right done the first time.

Do you know any open source traffic logging software, preferrably windows, looking for a good base to work with.

Thanks you,
AndAgain

[larryn]

AndAgain,

I'm affiliated with a closed-source analysis tool, so I can't point you to an open source one. Did you try sourceforge?

Larry

[AndAgain]

No other comments?

[gregbo]

Are you asking what kinds of data can be logged, or what other ways are there of collecting data other than logs?

If you can run an open source web server such as Apache, you can basically modify it to log anything that the web server receives from HTTP, etc. There are also ways to use Javascript to produce the type of data that is included in logs, but not all browsers support or enable Javascript.