Web Page Hit Counter

You can keep track of how many hit your Web pages are recieving with a CGI Web Page Hit Counter. The counter available on Athena is Count by Muhammad A Muquit. It allows you to keep track of your hits and display them with a graphical counter on your page. There are several diffrent lettering styles to choose from. Here's are the steps you need to take:

1. You must first decide on a name for the data file that will contain the count for your page. You will not create the file yourself--the Count.cgi program will create it for you automatically the first time that your page is accessed with the counter on it. All you have to do now is decide on a unique name to use with Count.cgi in a later step below. Please choose a name that is very descriptive so that it will not conflict with someone else's count data file. DO NOT use a generic name like "mycount" or "count" or "homepage". Instead, use a name like "athletics-home", "ophthalmology-news"--something descriptive of your page and department. If the counter is being used for an individual/personal page, precede the name with your userid (e.g., "jpjoey01.home"). You can view the directory of data files to check and make sure that the name you intend to use is not already in use. Just use your browser's "Find" or "Search" command to search the directory listing.

2. Decide whether you want the count to start at zero or whether you want to preset it to a number of your choice. If you want it to start at a preset number you should add the "st" option (you'll see how to add options in the next step).

   The st option will only be needed for the first time your page is accessed with the new counter. After the first access you can take the "st" option out. So if you want the counter to start at 178 you should put "st=178" in your list of options.

3. Now you have to put an IMG tag for the counter somewhere on the page that you want to keep track of. The IMG tag should look like this:

         <img src="/cgi-bin/Count.cgi?df=datafile|dd=odometer|ft=0" alt="" />

   This tag displays a graphic on your page that is supplied by the Count.cgi program. Everything that appears after the "?" on this line are options that you can set. Notice that all of the options are separated by the vertical bar character "|". The "df" option tells it the name of the data file to use. The "dd" option tells it the name of the lettering style to use (in this case the "odometer" style). "ft" tells it how thick the frame around the graphic should be. There is a large list of options available with Count. Look at the list of options to find out what you can put after the ? to change the look of the counter on your page. For instance, you can add the "md" option to specify the maximum number of digits you want it to display (e.g., md=6).

   There are several lettering styles to choose from, and we will be adding more soon.