AWStats

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AWStats

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Basic data

developer Laurent Destailleur
Publishing year 2000
Current  version 7.7 (January 7, 2018)
operating system platform independent
programming language Pearl
category Log file analysis
License GPL ( Free Software )
German speaking Yes
awstats.org

AWStats is a free web analytics - software . It is used to evaluate log files that web servers create on the basis of visitor requests. AWStats generates reports as HTML pages that can be viewed with a browser and in this way, for example , can be linked directly from the analyzed website .

background

The script can handle log files from web, mail or FTP servers . It was written in the Perl programming language and is distributed under the GNU General Public License .

AWStats supports the most important web server log formats such as Apache ( NCSA combined / XLF / ELF log format or common / CLF log file format), WebStar , IIS ( W3C log file format) and many more. It generates graphical and text-based statistics from the log files, whereby image files are not generated directly , but the graphics are simulated using HTML tables and CSS constructs.

Since AWStats is based exclusively on Perl and only needs a few CPAN modules to run, it can run on any operating system that supports Perl .

Working method

Screenshot of a typical output from AWStats
Bar charts showing the monthly rate of visits to the analyzed website

AWStats is called up regularly, usually on a daily basis (e.g. automatically by a cron job ). Each time it is called, AWStats scans the existing statistics and uses a buffer to check which log lines have already been analyzed. It then analyzes newly added log lines and adds them to its database and updates the HTML summaries. Depending on the configuration, AWStats can, after the evaluation, show in a bar chart what time a call was made, how much data was transferred, which browser version was used, from which computer and from which address the visitor came. This creates meaningful results together with all other log lines.

application

AWStats can be operated in two different modes: Either as a background program or as a CGI program (or with the help of mod perl ).

In the former mode, AWStats generates static HTML files after a single call. In principle, AWStats also does this with the second variant, but there are also additional functions that allow individual inquiries from visitors, such as an overview of the browsers used between March 2007 and April 2009 . This analysis data is then generated immediately upon request. This inevitably leads to a higher server load than the pure display of static files.

Configuration and extensions

AWStats is adapted by an extensively documented configuration file that follows a simple syntax of the form 

# Kommentar
Eigenschaft="Wert"
AndereEigenschaft="Wert"

served. In addition, AWStats can be expanded with so-called "Extra Sections". These are short pieces of code that make it possible to generate special statistics.

Alternatives

Webalizer is often named as a competing free program of roughly the same size .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Laurent Destailleur on destailleur.fr