Server logfiles

You can send data from logfiles with the goatcounter import command; for example:

$ export GOATCOUNTER_API_KEY=[..]
$ goatcounter import -follow -format=combined -exclude=static \
  -site='https://s.jarv.org' \
  /var/log/nginx/access_log

This will keep watching the file for changes and report new pageviews as they come in. You can also batch import the data from logfiles by dropping the -follow flag.

See goatcounter help import and goatcounter help logfile for more details.

The biggest advantage of this is that you won’t need to add any JavaScript to your site and that nothing will be blocked by adblockers, but there are a few downsides as well:

  • There will be more bot requests.
  • Some data won’t be available: screen sizes, page titles.
  • It won’t disambiguate to canonical paths from <link rel="canonical">; i.e. /page and /page?x=y will show up as two different paths.

Questions or problems?

Feel free to get in touch if you’ve got any questions or having any problems; a lot of times they can be resolved without too much problems.

Ways to contact me: show