GPL Analytics - Great Alternative to Google

[Aussie-Dave]

Hi,

Found this today Piwik - Web analytics - Open source

Well worth checking out. I'm going to give it a try. More so cause I'm always paranoid of what information Google obtains from my analytical data.


Cheers



Dave

 

[WCD Admin]

Having a closer look at that myself... interesting. I fired it off to "smart" people and I'll let you know if they got excited or not (chuckle)

 

[Guard Dog]

It does look nice. Would be wise to look at and understand the database structure, though, if you have a site with any traffic.

Remember the recent 'very slow' AGD??? That had a ton to do with the analytics I was using which created a super-large database. You don't want that! Trust me

 

[WCD Admin]

Interesting. I had openX / openAds keep crashing our server and grinding us to a hault from having an overloaded (non-purging) table or something. don't know much about that stuff but disabling that really fixed us up!

 

[tryme1]

What Guard Dog says is spot on - but I'm going to give this a go. I could do with a decent analytics package that offers what Google Analytics does but without the, er, Google part!

@WCD Admin - Yeah, I had the same problem with Open X. I use a bunch of different ad managing software, but for the sites that are most important I use AdPeeps.

Frankly, I think AdPeeps is the best php ad management software on the market. I'm not going to evangelise about it, but you can find it at Ad Peeps.com

 

[Guard Dog]

Frankly, I think AdPeeps is the best php ad management software on the market. I'm not going to evangelise about it, but you can find it at Ad Peeps.com

Except their support is completely non-existant. I've used it too and liked it also, but hate the support (or lack thereof).

 

[tryme1]

I had heard that as well, which put me off buying it originally, but the support in the last year or so has been very good. I don't know when you bought it, but they really have got their act together.

I think it's pretty much a one man band, but the product is top class and is extremely well coded.

 

[Guard Dog]

I picked it up about 2-3 years ago (probably 3) and coded a lot of stuff from my admin to auto-add banners and auto-add pages to my CasinoBonusFarm.com website. It was pretty awesome, but then things happened and I couldn't get answers from the software team, so I essentially stopped developing that site because of it

I'll have to check into it again because I was starting to use OpenX Ads on all my sites again and I definitely liked the way AdPeeps worked a lot better. Would love to check out a demo of it sometime to see if it is just the same software or if it has new features.

 

[tryme1]

They seem to update around every 4-6 months currently and have recently launched a remotely hosted solution, so I don't think it's the same as it was when you first used it. Support is definitely better - I think the guy behind it realized he was on to a winner and has stepped up to the plate.

For me, the combination of a) geo targeted ads (and content), b) the small file size of the whole program and the fact that Adpeeps just works without having to mess around makes it a good piece of software.

I use it extensively on www.gambling-source.co.uk and I also use it to deliver geo-targeted content and ads on a bunch of other sites that I don't really want to link to from here. I also like the fact that they have a 'multi-user account' license option which means you can buy one installation and use it on all your domains.

Might be time to revist it, Andy.

 

[Guard Dog]

It looks the same from the backend application, but I'm sure there are some under the hood changes. I don't think I'll upgrade the site it is working on, but maybe will use it on some other websites.

Not sure yet, though, as I am considering writing a plugin for OpenX to bring all my sites together more easily.

 

[Guard Dog]

Piwik - Just installed on one of my sites I am updating. I'll let you all know what I think after about a month of testing.

 

[Chips]

I picked up Piwik a few months back and really have not had the chance to fool with it. I did attempt an installation on a mini site so there would less codes to swap out (from G) but it got in a fight with MySql and I did not have the time to chase it down.

I actually forgot I still had the files. Maybe in a few weeks I can give it another go. I would love to give big G the big boot. Curious to see how your testing goes with it.

How was the install? Any issues with setting it up?

 

[Guard Dog]

I'm really trying to see how this tool is beneficial, but am having a rough go of it. I see a lot of pretty graphs and stuff, but really I like to see simple stuff like:

A list of each surfer by IP and what site they came from (or SE) and which page they hit.

I can't find anything like that with Piwik Kind of a bummer because I removed my old tracking software to give this a try and now I have lost some of the most important pieces of information.

I hope it is in there somewhere and I just haven't found it yet.

 

[NDN]

Andy - your "Progressive Slots" signature link is not linking correctly.

 

[Guard Dog]

Andy - your "Progressive Slots" signature link is not linking correctly.

It is working now Not the best site, but is my first site!! Gotta update it some day.

 

[Guard Dog]

ok, so I am finding Piwik to be a little better now The missing information that I wanted (Visitor Logging) is there, but you have to activate the 'Live' plugin.

Once that is active, there is a 'Vistors Log' link under the Visitors menu. Now I am happy

As an FYI - there is another VERY interesting Open Source stats package called 'Open Web Analytics'. Has some pretty cool features. I might give that one a go too and find out which one I like more.