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Topic: Web Log Analyzers

Daryl C. W. O'Shea
Film God

Posts: 3977
From: Midland Ontario Canada (where Panavision & IMAX lenses come from)
Registered: Jun 2002

posted 11-07-2003 12:36 AM

Anyone have a recommendation for a good log analyzer for Windows Server 2000/2003 that doesn't suck the life out of the server when it runs (like Wusage does). The software must have a report for top sites by bandwidth usage (thanks to poorly designed search engines).

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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 11-07-2003 02:24 AM

Dude, if YOU don't know, you're probably asking the wrong crowd.

Also, we frown upon cross-posting. So now you are prohibited from posting this same question in a forum of computer geeks who might actually know. Looks like you've really dug a hole for yourself.

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Scott Jentsch
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1061
From: New Berlin, WI, USA
Registered: Apr 2003

posted 11-07-2003 04:09 PM

Daryl,

Analog can do just about anything you want it to:

http://www.analog.cx/

I don't know how well it works with Windows Server logs, as I've been successful in avoiding Windows web servers, but take a look and see if Analog will parse the log format your server uses.

Webalizer is another analysis product that I've used, but I don't like it as much as Analog:

http://www.mrunix.net/webalizer/

Another analyzer that looks very cool is Urchin:

http://www.urchin.com/

I don't have any personal experience with it, but it looked very useful and produced pretty reports that managers and customers like so much.

Scott

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Brad Miller
Administrator

Posts: 17775
From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall)
Registered: May 99

posted 11-07-2003 04:58 PM

I'm surprised Daryl didn't just write up his own program during a #2 in the bathroom.

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Daryl C. W. O'Shea
Film God

Posts: 3977
From: Midland Ontario Canada (where Panavision & IMAX lenses come from)
Registered: Jun 2002

posted 11-07-2003 07:42 PM

Nobody said it was a Windows webserver (i.e. IIS)... the software just needs to be able to run on Windows. [Smile]

I wouldn't host a network failure on IIS.

I'll look at the software you suggested Scott. I think I might have had the same problem with Webalizer though... chewed up way too much CPU time.

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Scott Jentsch
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1061
From: New Berlin, WI, USA
Registered: Apr 2003

posted 11-10-2003 11:59 AM

I ran a test on the local installation of Analog 5.32 that I have on my Windows XP machine to see what the CPU load would be.

The test setup is comprised of accessing 92 apache log files spread across three directories (one for each month). My PC is a 2.4GHz P4 with 1GB of RAM with two Seagate Barracuda 80GB IDE drives (7200rpm).

There are a total of 34,495,085 counted by Analog, which took 5 mins 9 secs to create the report. I would imagine that the time it took would depend greatly on the number of reports that you run; I have it generating 20 reports into a single output file.

While it was running, the CPU usage varied between 40-69%, but would drop to 0-4% from time to time. At no time does this noticeably drag on my system, while I'm running Mozilla with several tabs open, a web editor, an E-Mail program, and Photoshop, with maybe an FTP program from time to time.

There may be ways to tweak Analog so that it takes less CPU time or less memory, probably in exchange for slower report times.

It's incredibly flexible in what it can do and it's free, so that's hard to beat. The only knock is that it doesn't produce the super-pretty results that many management types like to look at.

If you try Urchin, please let me know what you think of it!

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Don Bruechert
Mmmmmmmmm, bird!

Posts: 340
From: Manitowoc, WI, USA
Registered: Jan 2003

posted 11-10-2003 02:39 PM

Daryl,

I am using Awstats log analyzer and I like it very much. It is written in perl, tells me everything I want to know, and it is free. Here us the link to where you can get it: Awstats I stay right on the bleeding edge of this, running his betas, and I have never found a major bug.

If you are interested in seeing live stats, email me and I will send you a link or two - I use basic auth one one of my sites, but I have 2 that are unprotected - I'm just not comfortable posting the information here.

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Daryl C. W. O'Shea
Film God

Posts: 3977
From: Midland Ontario Canada (where Panavision & IMAX lenses come from)
Registered: Jun 2002

posted 11-10-2003 05:12 PM

I briefly looked at Analog's site last night... then remembered that I actually use Analog (and have for many years) on a bunch of unix servers. I didn't know it would run under Win32.

Don, when I get around to doing something I might take a look. Thanks.

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