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RCounter
© 2001 Bendersky Maxim
© 2001 Rusin Alexander

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INSTALLATION

Contents

1. SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
2. INSTALLATION AND INITIAL SYSTEM SETTING

    2.1. General instructions about installation and setting

    2.2.Placing several bases of the counters in one directory

    2.3. Questions of safety

3. SOME RECOMMENDATIONS FOR "RCounter" SYSTEM MANAGEMENT

4. DELETING (UNINSTALL) AND MOVING THE SYSTEM

5. ADDITIONAL USEFUL DOCUMENTATION, INTERNET-RESOURCES, ADDRESSES

1. SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

The “RCounter” system has a “thin client-server” architecture. The server part of the system (main applications of the “RCounter” package) is intended for installation on the web-server. A usual internet-browser is the client of this system.

Server requirements:

The server applications of the system support various platforms.

  • The version for Windows is installed on the server with a Win32 operating system: NT 4.0, NT 2000 and higher. This version works under such web-servers as MS IIS, MS PVS or Apache for Windows. The system was tested on the following servers: Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, MS IIS 4, MS IIS 5 and Apache for Windows 1.3.12.
  • Linux and FreeBSD versions are intended for Unix family (Linux RedHat and FreeBSD accordingly, but basically, usage of other unix-systems for the x86-platform is possible). For installation on FreeBSD, the "linux_base 6.1" package is required from additional components and libraries. Any other modules (KDE, etc) are not required. Thus, web-applications of the RCounter package are efficient on unix-systems in the minimum configuration. The RCounter system is integrated with the web-server, the described version was tested for the purpose of serviceability together with Apache for Linux (Linux RedHat 7.0 was used) and Apache for FreeBSD (FreeBSD 4.3 was used).

Note: for Linux/FreeBSD version, RCounter is delivered in ready-to-use, the compiled form and it does not need additional assembly - it means that availability of compilers is not necessary.

There are no special requirements to the hardware configuration of the server, the system should successfully work on any computer, which hardware configuration meets the requirements of the operating system and the web-server.

There are no special requirements to the Internet connection bandwidth. The counter call in the mode of skin display "enlarges" the size of site pages on 1-6 KB depending on the size and the skin structure. As a rule, it does not exceed 5 % from the size of the site pages "without the counter" and consequently it is not the reason for increasing the Internet channel bandwidth.

If you have a lot of visits on the pages, where the counter call is placed, the processor speed on the server may limit the speed of responce. It is caused by that during opening each page with the code counter, it is carried out “RCounter” database opening, working with it and subsequent closing. If you have less than 1000 hits per day, this factor should not play any role. If you have over 10,000 hits per day, this factor will be inevitable to take place and in this case for the server it is recommended a P-II-400 processor (or more powerful).

Testing of the RCounter system was carried out on servers with the following configurations:

  • Pentium - II-233, 66MHz bus, 192 Mb RAM, MS Windows 2000 server, IIS 5;

  • Celeron-333, 66 MHz bus, 128 Mb RAM, MS Windows NT4 server, IIS 4.

During testing and operation the insufficiency in the hardware configuration of servers was not observed.

Client requirements:

A usual internet-browser under any operating system can be the client of this system. There are no special requirements to the configuration of a browser or availability of additional components on the client computer. It concerns both pages, from which the counter call is carried, and the page of administration of the counter (review of statistics and adjustments).

Flash, Java machine or other similar ones are not required.

The browsers IE 4, IE 5, NC 4.05, Opera 5.02 were used for testing.

Additional utilities of the package:

The RCounter package, except the main applications, includes also utilities for realization of service operations with the counter database. These utilities are developed for Win32 operating system (Windows 95/98/NT4/ME/2000) and have not any special requests to the hardware configuration of the computer or availability of additional applications on it (drivers, services, and servers).

2. Installation and initial system setting

Warning: The information of this chapter is intended first of all for the web-masters and web-server administrators. The special knowledge and management right of the web-server are necessary for execution of some installation stages. If you do not have these rights or enough experience – turn to your site administrator (web-master).

2.1. General instructions about installation and setting

For installation of the system it is necessary to execute the following operations:

  1. Unpack archive with files of the package in the separate directory on your hard disk. If the package is delivered as a self-extracting archive or as a package with the program-installer - start it.

  2. Copy counter.exe and counter.cgi (after dearchiving the package they are located in the "BIN" subdirectory) to the directory of the web-server, which is intended for starting scripts (usually - "cgi-bin" or "scripts"). Both files should be in one directory!

    Make sure, that the "activation cgi-scripts" option for this directory is enabled. An apache web-server creates such directory by default, it is named cgi-bin; for a Microsoft IIS web-server it is necessary to mark a tag, as shown in pictures below or ask your system administrator to allow script execution in this directory.

    Warning: If it is planned to put the RCounter bases in the same place on your server for several sites - previously it is necessary to rename files counter.exe and counter.cgi, - read about this operation below.

  3. The important step that is different for Windows and UNIX:
  4. UNIX
      Execute operations for installation of access rights to these files:
    • chmod 755 counter.exe
    • chmod 755 counter.cgi
    • execute any of these files with the key INSTALL (for example: ./counter.exe INSTALL). A database file with the .esf extension will be created in the current catalog.
    • give access rights for reading and recording to the created database file: chmod 666 counter.esf

      Add the following lines in the configuration file of the Apache web-server (httpd.conf) (if they are absent):
    • AddHandler cgi-script .cgi
    • AddHandler cgi-script .exe

      Make sure that there is a line indicating location of the catalog, in which it is authorized to start scripts in the httpd.conf file. Example:
    • ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ " /var/www/cgi-bin / "
      Please, check that you have placed the applications of the system exactly in this catalog.

    WINDOWS
      It is not necessary to execute special operations for database creation of the counter. At accessing to any of the package application (counter.exe, counter.cgi) - in the directory, where they are located, the same file with the extension .esf will be created automatically (if this file did not exist at the moment of call), this is the file with RCounter database.
  5. It is necessary to include request to the counter with the necessary parameters for site pages, about which visiting you have decided to gather statistics. RCounter.doc is devoted to the rules of counter call from site and parameters of the counter. Also there are some examples of calls in the "RCounter.doc", and you can see some "live" examples of counter usage on the site www.rcounter.noonet.ru.

  6. Notice that the name of the database file always (!) coincides with the name of the counter application.

  7. Call the page of the RCounter system control and statistic review. URL for call of this page depends on your site name and web-server settings. For www.name.ru, this name can be www.name.ru/cgi-bin/counter.cgi. On this page you can install some useful settings in the "Edit settings" heading. More detail read about counter setting, kinds and meanings of parameters in RCounter.doc. The counter setting is not mandatory step during its installation on the site, but it is strongly recommended. During system setting you can also install the counter skin which is the most suitable to your site (more detail it is described in RCounter.doc).

  8. You should go on the site on which the counter is installed for checking counter efficiency. If you did not specify the inhibition for counter display in call parameters - it should appear one of its skins with the number indicating quantity of visits on the site from the moment of installation. Most likely it will be the number "1". After that, again go on the page of statistics review and counter management, - the information about your "test" visit should appear on this page (if you did not add your computer's IP-address in the skip-list). If something from these events has not taken place - some problems were during installation, and you should return to one of the above-described steps.

  9. If the installation has passed successfully and the counter works correctly - it is strongly recommended to add IP-address of your computer to the skip-list. Also it is possible to add computers' IP-addresses of your colleagues, who are involved in development and debugging of the site. It will allow you to exclude your "test" visits from the site statistics. More detail read about it in the chapter devoted statistics and counter set-up.

  10. Having adjusted the counter, you can think about questions of safety for settings and confidentiality of your statistics. After executed installation steps, statistics and settings of your site are accessible on the administration page. But now they are accessible not only for you, but also for everyone who knows or guesses URL of the administration page. If you wish, that access to settings and statistics will be only for you, please, read the section about it at the end of this chapter.

  11. If you already have visit statistics of your site and you would like to continue it with the help of the RCounter system you can add your old visits to the RCounter system - just take the database, created by the counter, (file *.esf), copy it from the server on your local computer. Use "Overcounter" program, which is delivered in the package (more detail how it works you can find in RCounter.doc) and after you "overcounter" statistics in the base - copy it back on the server.

  12. In the end of the installation process it is recommended again to address to its appearance, more exactly - to the choice of a skin. Except the standard set of skins, delivered in the package, some works of independent authors are available on www.rcounter.noonet.ru. Also it is supposed to publish and update skins, developed by the authors of the package.

“MS IIS 4” web-server settings for cgi-scripts:


“MS IIS 5” web-server settings for cgi-scripts:


2.2. Placing several bases of the counters in one directory

When cgi-scripts for several sites are placed in one directory of web-server, the installation process of the counter should be done a little bit differently. The difficulty is that the counter places the base of visits in “counter.esf” file by default. So, if some sites use RCounter, and place cgi-scripts in the same directory without special operations, all of them will work with the same base of the counter, thus the common statistics will capture on all these sites.

In this situation, for gathering statistics on different sites in different bases, it is necessary to rename pairs of files “counter.cgi” and “counter.exe” for different sites and give them the original name, for example, in the same way as the site name.

For example, when we place three sites “RemLo”, “GreenLeaf” and “SibCat”, the most efficient use of the RCounter applications is then we use the following names: for RemLo - remlo.exe, remlo.cgi; for GreenLeaf - greenleaf.exe, greenleaf.cgi; for SibCat - sibcat.exe, sibcat.cgi in the directory cgi-scripts. In this case, for these sites it will be created and used the statistics databases with the following names: remlo.esf, greenleaf.esf, sibcat.esf (accordingly).

2.3. Questions of safety

As the access to counter settings and site statistics is carried out via the web-interface (using Internet, after input special URL), there is a problem of safety. If you do not undertake any protection moves described in the present item, then potentially anyone who will guess or will pick up URL pages of administration can receive access to your counter statistics and settings. Generally speaking, the danger it is not big - everything, that a malefactor can make is to view statistics of your site (which can be confidential), change the counter adjustment and its appearance, delete a part of statistics. Most dangerous thing that can be made by a malefactor, who has access to the page of administration, is deleting node statistics (for separate pages of the site). But it is completely impossible to delete all statistics or destroy the database through the web-interface!

It is necessary to note, that not for each site it is meaningful to take care of statistics protection. If you use RCounter for your home page - that it is very improbable, that there will be a hacker, who will waste time to view your statistics and mutilate the counter appearance.

But, if RCounter is used for statistics of a large corporate site - then it is simply necessary to execute safety measures described below! You see in this case statistics may have real commercial value, and the probability of existence of hackers wishing to destroy your site, may be high enough.

There are some methods, which will allow you to increase safety or even completely exclude possibility of breaking:

  1. Having added any complex (long) name to counter.exe and counter.cgi applications (and the counter base together with them!), you extremely complicate a problem of access to statistics and settings to a hacker. As the application name of the counter is definitely included in URL pages of administration, while it will not be guessed or picked up the access to the page of administration will be impossible. For example, guessing or selection of “sibcat_19032001_admin.cgi” name is rather problematic. Do not forget only, that counter.exe, counter.cgi, and counter.esf should be renamed synchronously. This method does not guarantee safety, but it is extremely simple and always accessible, irrespective of a type and settings of web-server;

  2. Creation of backup copies of the counter base. It is recommended periodically to create backup copies of the counter base (*.esf). It is stored statistics as well as counter settings (including skins) in the base. The reserve copying increases protection of the information not only from potentially dangerous operations through the page of administration , but also from other risks (breaking of the web-server and deleting of the site together with counter base, failures of the server and physical losses of the information);

  3. Deleting counter.cgi from the server temporarily, while you do not use the page of administration . When you need the access to statistics and settings of the counter – just place counter.cgi in the directory of the web-server with scripts. Having completed to work with the page of administration, you can delete this file from the server (it is not necessary for gathering statistic and the counter display). But do not delete casually counter.exe - it just answers for gathering statistic and the counter display. This method is not convenient in usage, but it is very simple and practically completely excludes possibility of potentially dangerous operations through the page of administration. The method can be recommended if you seldom use the page of administration;

  4. More progressive and furthermore rather reliable method - password installation on the page of administration. This possibility is provided on the level of operating system and web-server.
  1. If you are not a web-server administrator, please ask your administrator to close access for a required resource (for example: /cgi-bin/counter.cgi) for all users except you. Also, ask your administrator to give you the password for access.

  2. If you are an administrator this web-server, make the following operations:

UNIX
  • With the help of the htpasswd utility (it usually is in the /bin subdirectory of the apache web-server) create a user and his/her password. For this purpose it is necessary to start the utility with keys: htpasswd -c -b path_to_the_file user_name user_password, for example: htpasswd -c -b /var/www/user/.passwd superuser superpassword. The key -c is necessary for specifying only in the event that the file with the passwords is absent in this catalog. It is better to set standard for UNIX a file name with the passwords: ".passwd", then it will not be displayed at listing the catalog.

  • In the description of a virtual host in the file httpd.conf, appropriate to your site, it is necessary to make recording:
    < Location name_of your recourse >
    AuthUserFile " path to the file with the passwords "
    AuthType Basic
    AuthName "Message with a request to enter the password "
    Require a login name
    Order Allow, deny
    allow from all
    </Location>

    For example:
    < Location "/cgi-bin/counter.cgi" >
    AuthUserFile "/var/www/user/.passwd"
    AuthType Basic
    AuthName " Please enter login information "
    Require superuser
    Order allow, deny
    Allow from all
    </Location>
  • It is necessary to restart the apache web-server after realization of these operations.

WINDOWS
  • Open the console of IIS management;
  • Choose the necessary site and open the directory, where the files of the system are located;
  • Choose the file with the extension .CGI (module of web-interface of system administration) and you will see the window of object characteristics after click of the right button and choosing "Properties" from the contextual menu;
  • It is necessary to choose the "File Security" tab from this window, then choose "Anonimous Access and Autentification control" on it, and press the Edit button;
  • You should install the tag opposite the "Basic Autentification" option in appeared window. Then, after pressing the Edit button, select a domain, which users can receive access to the resource;
  • It is necessary to remove the tag opposite the "Allow Anonimous access" option;
  • Close all open windows, pressing "OK", where it is necessary.

The appearance of administration windows mentioned above, is indicated on figures (with marks of parameters, which should be changed):


3. Some recommendations for the RCounter system management

As a whole, the RCounter system, after successful installation, works completely independently. All what correct statistics gathering needs - stable work of server and permanent web-server settings.

However, it is necessary to consider attentively the following recommendations, which will allow not only permanently using the RCounter system, but also be quiet for safety and urgency of statistics.

  1. Establish the system of reserve copying of the counter base (file *.esf). You can simply regularly copy this file from the server to your computer, “in a dry cool place ”. The weekly reserve copying of base is recommended, in the most responsible case - daily;

  2. Do not forget to install the code of the counter call in new pages of your site (or during processing existing). If this work is not your responsibility, please, remind your web-master about it. Remember, that neglecting this operation, you gradually will bring to nothing benefit from RCounter, because more than 30 % of your site pages will be deprived of the counter calls - statistics becomes very inexact. Note: you can find detail information about the rules of inclusion of the counter code in html-page (and its parameters) in RCounter.doc;

  3. The previous advice, apparently, is very trivial, but in practice it is fast forgotten and therefore the authors of the RCounter system give another advice: “Write advice ą2 on a sticker and attach it on the system block of your computer ”. This operation will give you some dividends by the way of qualitative, urgent statistics during all time of your site existence;

  4. Do not forget about the skin of the counter (if you have selected the mode, when the counter is displayed on the site) during updating the design of your site, even if you simply correct colors or fonts. It is not necessary to change the skin of the counter each time completely or do a new one (more suitable for new design), you can simply correct existing skin (just change colors/fonts slightly). You can find detail information about it in RCounter.doc.

4. Deleting (uninstall) and moving the system

Deleting (uninstall)

For deleting the system, it is enough to exclude calls of the counter and reference to page of administration from all sites (from all pages of sites), on which the statistics was taken into account or with which the administration of the system was called.

It is possible also to delete applications and the database of the system from the server, but it is not so necessary - only from reasons of place economy.

Applications, which were located on your local computer (and documentation) - do not require any special uninstall and can be simply deleted.

Moving the system

For moving the system on other server it is necessary to execute installation of the system on a new place, and on old one - uninstall, as it is described in the appropriate chapters.

If the system is transferred together with the site, on which the statistics was conducted, and accumulated the database - the site and DB are transferred by simple file copying. It may be necessary more complex operations than copying, only in the event than on a new place the catalog for web-applications (cgi-bin) has different name than old one for the server.

5. Additional useful documentation, Internet-resources, addresses

Please, visit www.rcounter.noonet.ru to find other documentation and articles about the RCounter product, new product versions, add-ons, and plug-ins as well as free version of the product and some examples of its usage.

Some references to the RCounter documentation:

  1. Product structure. "Contents.doc" is in the root directory of the product;
  2. License and warranties. License.doc is in the root directory of the product.;
  3. User documentation. "RCounter.doc" is in the root directory of the product.
Some Internet-resources:
  1. www.rcounter.noonet.ru - Internet-site of the RCounter product.
  2. www.noonet.ru & www.noonet.ru/eng - Internet-studio NooNet (our web-hosting provider, thank them for a lot of help and useful consulting).

Electronic addresses:

Maxim Bendersky - remlo@noonet.ru
Alexander Rusin - amfora@lvs.ru
NooNet studio noonet@noonet.ru

RCounter v1.0 multiplatform. FREE
Count your visitors!
INSTALLATION.

Developed by Bendersky Maxim © 2001
Tested and documented by Rusin Alexander © 2001
English translation by Sheremet Dmitry © 2001
November 09, 2001.