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Web Site Tracking Methods

Explanation of Site Usage & Visitor Statistics Tracking

  Files       Hits       Kbytes       Pages      Referrers      Response codes       Sites 
Unique search strings       Unique URLs       Unique User Agents        Usernames     and    Visits

Files: The number of files that have been requested (downloaded) from the web site during the report period. 

Web sites contain a collection of computer files, which are sent by a remote computer (Web server) to the client (Web browser) as the client requests them. Files (the outgoing response to a request) include all viable Web file formats, such as HTML files (.html), graphics files (.gif, .jpg or .png), Adobe Acrobat files (.pdf), Macromedia Flash files (.swf), Microsoft Word files (.doc) ASP files (.asp), etc.  The relationship between hits and files can be thought of as incoming requests and outgoing responses.

Hits: The total number of requests that were made to the site during the report period.

Any request made to the Web server is logged as a hit. The request can be for files, such as an HTML page, graphic image, audio file or CGI script, or for queries made by search engine spiders.

KBytes: The amount of data in kilobytes (KB) sent out by the server during the report period.

Though not exact, this figure is a fairly accurate representation of the amount of outgoing traffic the server had.  Note: 1 KB = 1,024 bytes, not 1,000 bytes (let's not get to arcane with the reason behind this)

Pages (Also called Page Views): The number of pages viewed during the report period.

Hypertext mark-up files (.html or .htm) and files that generate HTML documents (for example, .asp .cgi). are considered pages, with the definition of a page varying by server. Some people consider the pages total to be the number of pure hits. In other words, it is a truer indication of the traffic your site receives. Our web hosting service's computer servers define as a page any file with one of the following extensions ( * represents any character):

.htm*     .cgi     .chtml    .shtml     .phtml     .php*     .pl     .py     

Referrers: The record of the URLs from which a request was made during the report period.

Example: A user follows a link on www.websiteA.com to your site. The URL of the linking page (www.websiteA.com) is the referring URL or referrer.

Response Codes: (also called status codes) are the coded results of a server's attempt to understand and satisfy a request.

Web server responses indicate whether a Web object (Web page, graphics file, CGI script, etc.) was successfully retrieved or executed and, if not, the reason for the unsuccessful result. Unsuccessful results are also referred to as server error codes. The following codes are some of the most common responses:

Code 200 - OK: The request was fulfilled. The Web page was successfully downloaded without error.

Code 401 - Unauthorized: The code indicates that users have tried to access pages that are restricted to a private network or IP address.

Code 404 - Not Found: The server has not found anything matching the URL given, which can indicate broken links in the Web site due to the removal of a Web page or other resource. Alternatively, the response may indicate spelling errors in the URL.

Code 403- Forbidden: The request is for something forbidden. The code indicates that users have tried to access pages that require user authorization, such as password-protected administration areas or members areas.

Code 500 - Internal Error: The request failed. The server encountered an unexpected condition which prevented it from fulfilling the request. This code often indicates a script error.

Search Strings: The record of all unique search strings obtained from the end of the referrer URLs during the report period.  Search strings are the words entered by users into a search engine or directory to locate information.

Sites: The record of all unique IP addresses that made requests to the Web site during the report period.

The Internet is a network of computers that can share files with one another via a common protocol. Each computer on the network has a unique IP (Internet Protocol) address, which identifies that computer and differentiates it from other computers on the network. Each request made to the server comes from a unique IP address or site.

Note: The number of sites does not represent the number of individual users or individual computers accessing the Web site. Due to factors, such as multiple people working on the same network, it is impossible to determine a unique visitor total using only logs and HTTP protocol. Still, this number can be used as a close approximation.  For example: Private networks connecting to the Internet via a router use a single IP address (the router IP address) for security purposes, so one site can represent multiple users.

URLs: The number of unique URLs at your site accessed during the report period.  The Uniform Resource Locator (URL) or Web address identifies the location of a file on the Internet, such as a Web page or an image on the page. The information is sent to the Web server whenever a user follows a link on a Web page or types a URL directly into the address bar of the Web browser.

User Agents: The record of the unique programs and devices used to access the web site.  User agents include the following computer program types:

Web browsers  (such as Internet Explorer, Opera, or  Mozilla Firefox)

Search engine spiders  (like those from Yahoo! and Google)

Download managers (software that increases file download efficiency such as Download Accelerator)

Text-to-speech software and similar readers

Usernames: The record of usernames that accessed our site during the report period.  Log files record access by authorized users (any user with access to password-protected Web resources, such as site members or administrators).

Visits (also called Sessions): An attempt to measure the number of times visitors go to a Web site during the report period.

As page requests are made to the Web server from sites, the server records the IP address and the time which elapses between requests from that IP address. If the time between requests exceeds 30 minutes, PureHost Web servers record a new visit for that site. (For example: Someone visits a page at our site at 1:00 p.m. and then requests another page at 3:00 p.m. The server records two visits).  Due to the limitation of the HTTP protocol and other factors, the number of visits should not be taken as absolutely accurate. Rather, it should be considered a very close estimate.