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Properties

The actual calculations made by the Report Writer in producing your reports depend upon a detailed structure of data properties maintained in your database. The standard report composed above made use of them, but they are also available to you directly, so that you can tailor your analyses specifically to your sites and interests. i

Understanding Your Data

You manipulate the details of your analysis by means of a series of filters that operate on data properties. Typical reports might sort all activity on the site which originates from non-academic hosts, for example, or the average number of requests by the second user from each organization versus the average number of requests by the first user from each organization. The following tables summarize all of the data properties which can be filtered and calculated. i

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Request Properties

Each request to your Internet sites has the properties shown in the table below.

Property name	Property description	Example values
Date	The date of the request.	October 4, 1958, 8/29/95
Timestamp	The time and date of the request.	10/4/58 1:22 PM
Hour	The hour of the request.	0-23
Weekday	The day of the week.	0-6, Sunday, Monday
Week	The week of the year.	1-52
Month	The month of the year.	1-12, Jan, January
Quarter	The quarter of the year.	1-4
Year	The year.	1995
Filename ("File")	The requested file (URI of the URL).	/index.html, /order*, *.html
Title	The <TITLE> of the requested file, if media = html, otherwise title is blank.	"Home page"
Level 1 directory	The first directory from root ("/") that the request file is in. The root directory is also considered a level 1 directory.	/a
Level 2 directory	The second directory from root ("/") that the request file is in.	/a/b/
Level 3 directory	The third directory from root ("/") that the request file is in.	/a/b/c/
Level 4 directory	The fourth directory from root ("/") that the request file is in.	/a/b/c/d/
Level 5 directory	The fifth directory from root ("/") that the request file is in.	/a/b/c/d/e/
Level 6 directory	The sixth directory from root ("/") that the request file is in.	/a/b/c/d/e/f/
Media type ("Media")	The media type of the request file.	html, gif, jpeg, au, wav
Media type category ("MediaCat")	The category of the media type.	Archive, audio, document, image

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Visit Properties

Each visit to your Internet sites has the properties shown in the table below.

Property name	Property description	Example criteria values
Site title ("Site")	The title of the Internet site as specified in the Server manager of the Import module.	Usage Analyst marketing web site
Site ID ("SiteId")	A unique number Usage Analyst assigns to each of your Internet sites.	1,2,3, etc.
Browser product ("Browser")	The browser used to view the site.	Microsoft Internet Explorer, Netscape Navigator
Browser product version ("Version")	The version of the browser used to view the site.	1.1, 1.1N, 2.0
Browser product security ("Security")	The level of encryption security that the browser supports.	Exportable SSL (40 bit RC4 encryption)
Browser operating system ("Os")	Operating system of the visitor’s computer.	Windows (32 bit), UNIX - Sun
Referring URL ("RefUrl")	The referrer URL of the first request of the visit.	http://www.yahoo.com/awesome_sites.html
Referring organization type ("RefOrgtype")	The type of the organization whose site the referring URL is from. See Orgtype.	See orgtype
Referring organization name ("RefOrgname")	The name of the organization whose site the referring URL is from. See Orgname.	Your Corporation
Referring organization domain ("RefDomain")	The domain of the organization whose site the referring URL is from. See Domain.	yourcompany.com
Referring organization continent ("RefContinent")	The continent of the organization whose site the referring URL is from.	See continent
Referring organization country ("RefCountry")	The country of the organization whose site the referring URL is from.	See country
Referring organization region ("RefRegion")	The region of the organization whose site the referring URL is from.	See region
Referring organization state ("RefState")	The state of the organization whose site the referring URL is from.	See state
Referring organization city ("RefCity")	The city of the organization whose site the referring URL is from.	See city
Referring organization zip code ("RefZip")	The zip code of the organization whose site the referring URL is from.	See zip

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User Properties

Each user of your Internet sites has the properties shown in the table below.

Property name	Property description	Example criteria values
Cookie	The persistent client-state HTTP cookie used to identify the user.	INTERSÉ_!aQFG@4gd
Username	The user name used by this user to register at the site.	Bob
Hostname	The Internet host name address used by this user.	gateway.interse.com

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Organization Properties

Each organization with users of your Internet sites has the properties shown in the table below. In order to obtain this information for your database, you must first perform IP resolution and Whois lookup. (See Chapter 5.)

Property name	Property description	Example criteria values
Organization type ("Orgtype")	The type of organization as determined by parsing the Internet host name.	Commercial, academic, non-profit, Internet administrator, government, military, online service
Organization name ("Orgname")	The name of the organization that registered the domain of the host name.	Any Corporation
Organization domain ("Domain")	The part of the Internet host name that uniquely identifies an organization.	Anycompany.com
Continent	The continent where the country of the organization is located. The country is determined by parsing the Internet host name.	Asia, Europe, Africa, North America, Latin America, South America, Oceania
Country	The country where the organization is located. The country is determined by parsing the Internet host name.	USA, France, Germany, Canada
Region	The geographical region of the United States of the organization that registered the domain of the host name.	New England, Mid-Atlantic, East North Central, West North Central
State	The geographical state of the United States of the organization that registered the domain of the host name.	Full state name or its postal abbreviation (California or CA)
City	The geographical city of the United States of the organization that registered the domain of the host name.	Sunnyvale, Palo Alto, New York, Los Angeles, and so on
Zip	The geographical Zip code of the United States of the organization, or postal code of the Canadian organization that registered the domain of the host name.	94086, 94087

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The Data Hierarchy

Site Server Express Analysis organizes your data within an object-oriented data structure, so you can conduct complex analyses on trends within your Internet sites. With any request, visit, user, or organization property, you can create a calculation Filter or Group. Understanding this data structure is extremely important to making optimal use of the Report Writer.

As mentioned earlier, the data structure has four distinct objects:

• an organization
• a user
• a visit
• a request

The figure below illustrates the relationship between these objects.

Each request is assigned to a distinct visit; each visit is assigned to a distinct user; and each user is assigned to a distinct organization. Consider the complete picture of the traffic to your site as the world of major league sports. You could say that requests are like a series of games played by a professional athlete. Each game (request) is part of a season or series (visit) and each athlete (user) belongs to a distinct team (organization).

Note that each organization, user, and visit object in the hierarchy has three children: a "first," an "any," and a "last." Specifically,

All visits have three request objects associated with them:

• The first request of that visit
• Any requests of that visit
• The last request of that visit

All users have three visits objects associated with them:

• The first visit from that user
• Any visit from that user
• The last visit of that user

All organizations have three user objects associated with them:

• The first user to access the site from that organization
• Any user from that organization
• The last user to access the site from that organization

Every property has a path from a root object; where root objects are the requests, visits, users, and organizations that can be referred to as part of "any request, by any visit, by any user, from any organization." Properties along this any-any-any-any property path don’t need a prefix when being referenced within a Filter. For example, if you’re just interested in requests during January, then stating Date < 2/1/95 works.

All other properties must be referenced by a path from a root object. For example, if you want to reference the first visits of all of your users, just prefix the visit properties by "User, first visit, property name goes here."

Although it’s possible to refer to a property by its full path in the data hierarchy ("Organization, first user, first visit, first request, date," for example) there are numerous shortcuts, as shown in the table below

iiiiiiiiiiiiiiData property path shortcuts

Full path	Shortcut
Visit, first request	VFR_
Visit, first request, next request	VFRNR_
Visit, first request, next request, next request	VFRNRNR_
Visit, first request, next request, next request, next request	VFRNRNRNR_
Visit, first request, next request, next request, next request, next request	VFRNRNRNRNR_
Visit, any request	VAR_
Visit, any request, previous request	VARPR_
Visit, any request, previous request, previous request	VARPRPR_
Visit, any request, previous request, previous request, previous request	VARPRPRPR_
Visit, any request, previous request, previous request, previous request, previous request	VARPRPRPRPR_
Visit, any request, next request	VARNR_
Visit, any request, next request, next request	VARNRNR_
Visit, any request, next request, next request, next request	VARNRNRNR_
Visit, any request, next request, next request, next request, next request	VARNRNRNRNR_
Visit, last request	VLR_
Visit, last request, previous request	VLRPR_
Visit, last request, previous request, previous request	VLRPRPR_
Visit, last request, previous request, previous request, previous request	VLRPRPRPR_
Visit, last request, previous request, previous request, previous request, previous request	VLRPRPRPRPR_
User, first visit, first request	UFVFR_
User, first visit, any request	UFVAR_
User, first visit, last request	UFVLR_
User, any visit, first request	UAVFR_
User, any visit, any request	UAVAR_
User, any visit, last request	UAVLR_
User, last visit, first request	ULVFR_
User, last visit, any request	ULVAR_
User, last visit, last request	ULVLR_
Organization, first user, first visit, first request	OFUFVFR_
Organization, first user, first visit, any request	OFUFVAR_
Organization, first user, first visit, last request	OFUFVLR_
Organization, first user, any visit, first request	OFUAVFR_
Organization, first user, any visit, any request	OFUAVAR_
Organization, first user, any visit, last request	OFUAVLR_
Organization, first user, last visit, first request	OFULVFR_
Organization, first user, last visit, any request	OFULVAR_
Organization, first user, last visit, last request	OFULVLR_
Organization, any user, first visit, first request	OAUFVFR_
Organization, any user, first visit, any request	OAUFVAR_
Organization, any user, first visit, last request	OAUFVLR_
Organization, any user, any visit, first request	OAUAVFR_
Organization, any user, any visit, any request	OAUAVAR_
Organization, any user, any visit, last request	OAUAVLR_
Organization, any user, last visit, first request	OAULVFR_
Organization, any user, last visit, any request	OAULVAR_
Organization, any user, last visit, last request	OAULVLR_
Organization, last user, first visit, first request	OLUFVFR_
Organization, last user, first visit, any request	OLUFVAR_
Organization, last user, first visit, last request	OLUFVLR_
Organization, last user, last visit, first request	OLULVFR_
Organization, last user, last visit, any request	OLULVAR_
Organization, last user, last visit, last request	OLULVLR_

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Time

Only requests have a specific date and time associated with them. When you want to restrict a calculation to visits, users, or organizations active during a specific time period, you must use a specific request object, with a complete path from the visit, user, or organization object you’re analyzing; for example, "UFVAR_Date < 2/1/95", filters out all users except those whose first visit was before February 1, 1995.

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Filtering Data

The Report Writer provides for filtering of data at the section level, the calculation level, and the measure level of the analysis hierarchy. This allows you to look at highly specific subsets of data. For example:

• For only last week or this week
• For all files except audio
• For all users in the U.S. using Microsoft Explorer
• ^{For all users in France using Netscape Navigator}
• For all users in Germany using NCSA Mosaic

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Criteria Syntax

To provide the maximum flexibility, specify criteria using Boolean expressions of name/value pairs:

<name><operator><value> [<conjunction> <name><operator><value>][…] i

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Criteria Names

Criteria names are based on the properties of requests, visits, users, and organizations. Every property listed in the tables at the beginning of the Analysis module section can be used within a filter expression. Unless otherwise specified, the criteria name is the property name. For example,

• Weekday=Wednesday
• RefOrg=InfoSeek*

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Criteria Values

Different criteria values are appropriate for different properties. In general, a criteria value is either a date, an integer, a string, or a relative criteria expression. The property charts within the previous section provide example values for each property name. In general, values follow these rules:

• Dates can either be in the format x0:00 AM/PM or 00:00 (for example, 3:30 p.m. or 15:30)
• Integers can’t have commas
• Strings are case insensitive
• Strings containing spaces must be enclosed with quotes, otherwise quotes are optional
• Carriage returns are ignored within the filter expressions

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Relative Filter Values

Relative criteria expressions are useful if you want to create reusable files. For criteria names and expressions, see the following table.

Criteria name	Relative criteria values
Year	ThisYear, LastYear
Quarter	ThisQuarter, LastQuarter
Month	ThisMonth, LastMonth
Week	ThisWeek, LastWeek
Day	Today, Yesterday

For example, if you want to run a report every week that analyzes data for just the current week’s traffic, rather than constantly editing a filter to include traffic between the date seven days ago and today’s date, you can simply add the criterion:

Week = ThisWeek

Any of the relative values can have "[-+]#" appended to indicated a time period previous to the relative time period, measured in increments of that time period. For example, "ThisWeek-1" is the same as "LastWeek", "ThisWeek-2" is the week before last week, "Today-3" is the day before the day before yesterday, and "Month-2" is two months ago.

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Wildcard Criteria Values

Criteria values may include wildcard characters as shown in the table below.

Character	Usage	Example
*	Matches any number of characters. It can be used as the first or last character in the character string.	d* matches Debra and David
?	Matches any single alphabetic character.	jo?n matches John and Joan
[]	Matches any single character within the brackets.	[jt]erry matches Jerry and Terry, but not Kerry
!	Matches any character not in the brackets.	[!jt]erry matches Kerry, but not Jerry or Terry
-	Matches any one of a range of characters. You must specify the range in ascending order (A to Z, not Z to A).	[c-e]d matches cd, dd, and Ed

Note
When searching for *, ?, [, or - you must enclose the item you’re searching for in brackets (cgi[-]bin matches cgi-bin, for example.) i

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Criteria Operators

Criteria operators define the relationship between the name and value. Valid operators are:

=	when name equals value, i.e., Country=USA
<>	when name does not equal value, i.e., Country<>USA
<	when name is less than value, i.e., Hour < 12
>	when name is greater than value, i.e., Hour > 12
>=	when name is greater than, or equal to, value, i.e., Hour >=12
<=	when name is less than, or equal to, value, i.e., Hour<=12

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Criteria Conjunctions

Using criteria conjunctions and parenthesis, multiple name/value pairs may be strung together to create more complex criteria. Valid conjunctions are:

and	when both expressions must be true for the criteria to be true
or	when either expression can be true for the criteria to be true

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Example Data Filters

For examples of filters, see the table below.

Filter goal	Filter criteria
Only include files from the product directory	file = /product/*
Exclude files from the product directory	file <> /product/*
Include only the products, but not widget A	(file = /product/*) and (file<> product/widgetA*)
Only analyze requests for HTML files	media = HTML
Only analyze visits using an IE browser	product = Internet Explorer*
Analyze all traffic on December 25, 1995	Date = 12/25/95
Analyze all traffic from cities that start with San in the state of New Mexico	city = san* and state = NM
Analyze traffic for the previous month	month = LastMonth

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Sections

The top level of the hierarchy in the analysis tree is the Section, represented by the funnel icon. A section may contain sub-sections as well as calculations. They may also contain a filter expression which is applied to all sections and calculations within that section. i

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Section Properties: The Filter Tab

Sections can be filtered on all of the database properties. i

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Down-Sampling

Down-sampling works by performing analysis operations on a reduced portion of the data from your database. Depending on the factor you select, the analysis module will examine only those visits beginning in the first fraction of an hour. The integrity of the information is preserved by looking at entire visits (as opposed to imposing an arbitrary time cut-off, which would produce large numbers of open visits). In order to compensate for the artificially low numbers generated, the analysis module then multiplies all down-sampled results by the reciprocal of the down-sample factor. This effectively says, "Let the visits beginning in the first 1/x of each hour be considered typical, and multiply the resulting request-data by x, to approximate additional visits beginning in the remainder of the hour."

Note
Down-sampling is an operation performed during analysis only, and doesn’t otherwise affect the information stored in your database.

The Report Writer supports down-sampling of your data, which reduces effective data-size to as little as 1/3600th of the original. This can greatly speed the process of analyzing your data. The down-sampling tab allows you to specify the down-sampling factor for an analysis.

Down-sampling accepts integers from 1 to 3600, with the following results:

• Factor = 1/ 1 (default)

Your data is not affected by down-sampling. Results are unmodified.

• Factor = 1/ 2 to 1/ 60

All visits that begin within the first (factor x 60) minutes of the hour are analyzed, and all results are multiplied by (1/factor) to compensate.

• Factor = 1/ 61 to 1/ 3600

All visits that begin within the first (factor x 3600 ) seconds of the hour are analyzed, and all results are multiplied by (1/factor) to compensate.

Down-sampling reduces your computational time in direct proportion to the down-sampling factor. However, keep in mind the results of down-sampled calculations are approximations. i

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Section Properties: The Advanced Options Tab

The filter expression within a section can be treated in several different ways, represented by the advanced tab of the section form.

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Persistent Caching

When the Persistent caching option is checked, the Report Writer creates a set of temporary tables in the database containing the results of the filter entered in the Filter tab. These tables are then used for any calculations that need the filter. This process can greatly speed up reports than contain many calculations using the same filter, especially if the filter eliminates a large portion of the overall data set. For example, if your report is meant to display data for last week, and there is a year’s worth of data in your database, using a persistently cached filter of "week = lastweek" in the root section will greatly speed up the report. The temporary tables will continue to exist in your database and will be referenced by any future reports with compatible filters. These tables will be removed once the date defined in the expiration box is reached, or if new data is imported which invalidates them.

The Confine ‘first’ and ‘last’ dimensions to this filter checkbox allows you to define how this filter will treat first and last dimensions. If this box is checked, then any first and last dimensions will be limited to the data in the temporary tables. If not checked, the first and last dimensions are absolute over the entire data set within the database. For example, if the box is checked, a "User First Visit" property on a "week = lastweek" filter will refer to the user’s first visit that took place last week. However, if you wanted to count the number of new users visiting your site last week, you would want to count the number of "User First Visits" without the checkbox checked. That way, a user’s first visit would only be counted if it was the first visit for that user over the entire period contained in your database. i

Time Averaging

The time averaging option is by default set to Fast, but Sometimes Approximate. Consider using Accurate, but Sometimes Slow, if the section contains a measure or dimension that is averaged over a time period (average requests per hour, for example). As a rule of thumb, the fast time averaging should be used unless the filter removes chunks of time within the endpoints of the filter time period. For example, a filter that removes weekends or non-work hours should probably use the accurate time averaging. i

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Section Properties: The Description Tab

The description tab allows you to create a text description that will be contained in the report just under the section header. Use this option to create clear and readable reports.

Note
You must select the option to display the description on the Header presentation tab (by default section descriptions are not displayed).

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Section Properties: The Header Presentation Tab

The Header Presentation tab allows you to customize the look and feel of the section header and description report elements. The Filter name bar in the upper window is selected by default. To change your selection, simply click anywhere on the filter description bar.

Each element has several customization options: text properties, table cell properties, and table gridlines. In the text properties box, you can control various font elements, including style, size, and color. In the table cell properties, you determine if you want to display the filter name or description and the color of the display banner. Clicking the Visible box in the table gridlines box causes gridlines to be displayed. Click OK after you have made your selections or changes in this tab.

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Calculations

The calculation is the basic building block of the reports. One calculation represents a single slice of the data contained in the database. Each calculation can be viewed as a table or a graph. Calculations are made up of row dimensions, column dimensions, measures, and presentations.ii i

Calculation Properties: The Filter Tab

A calculation can have its own filter expression applied to it, in addition to any filters contained in its parent sections.

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The parent filter section of the filter tab displays the combined filters of all the sections above this calculation. Under this is the current filter box, in which the filter expression for this calculation can be entered.

Note
The advanced options available for section filters are not available for calculation filters.

To add a calculation filter, you have two options. You can type the filter expression into the window of the current filter box. Or, you can drag and drop filter terms and operators from the Reference terms section found at the bottom of the filter tab. Open the drop down list in that section to display the available filter terms. Select the one you want by clicking it, then dragging it into the current filter window. You will also find the supported Boolean operators (and, or, >, etc.) at the bottom of this list. Finally, you’ll need to type in the filter argument (ThisWeek, 2/25/97, for example).

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As in the Section property box, you can add a description that clearly explains the components of the calculation, its filters, what the results should be, and how they should be reviewed.

As in the Section property box, you can edit the calculation name and description style and appearance. i

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Dimensions

Dimensions are the properties that are used to divide up the data into an understandable table or graph format. Both row and column dimensions can be defined. The data that is output for each calculation will be based on the row and column dimensions defined for that calculation. For example, a calculation with a row dimension of country and a column dimension of week will create a table with the various countries along the side, and the various weeks along the top. The intersecting cells will contain the data for each country during each week.

Note
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Dimension properties: The Basis Tab

All of the Analysis Report properties can be used as dimensions. (See "Analysis report properties.") All of these properties can be found in the Basis tab’s tree divided up by category (requests, advertising requests, visits, users, and organizations). Any of the Measure properties can also be used as dimensions.

To select a dimension, simply navigate through the tree structure, then select the dimension you want by double clicking it or single clicking then clicking OK. Repeat this process to add additional dimensions.

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Dimension Properties: The Details Tab

Each dimension also has several options associated with it that influence how the calculation will be displayed.

The sorting options control how many items of this dimension are displayed, and what order they are displayed in. The results can be limited to a certain number (items) or a certain percent of the total (percent). These can be either the top or bottom amount of items based either on the value for the items themselves, or the total value of the first measure for each of the items.

The aggregate option lets you define whether or not you want the measures for this dimension aggregated for all items displayed. The total, minimum, maximum, average, or median for all items of this dimension can be displayed as the final element of the list. This characteristic only applies to tables.

Note
Aggregates only apply to certain measures. i

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Dimension Properties: The Measures as Dimensions Tab

Properties that formerly could only be treated as measures can now be used as dimensions. If you choose one of these measure properties in the tree on the Basis tab, a Measures as Dimensions tab appears with some options that are specific to this case.

Time-Averaging Option Box

In order to treat a measure as a dimension, the measure must be averaged over a user set. The user set averaging must also be based on a measure, and this averaging measure must be equal or higher on the object hierarchy. For example, a measure of number of visits can be averaged per user or per organization. If you chose number of visits per user as your dimension, the dimension items would be 1,2,3…, referring to the users who have one visit, two visits, or three visits. If your actual measure was the number of users, then your table or graph would contain each discreet number of visits in the dimension value and the number of users who had that many visits in the corresponding measure value.

A measure treated as a dimension can also be averaged over a time period. In this case, the discreet values for the dimension are rounded to the nearest whole number.

Note
When you choose to have a measure as a dimension, any other dimensions in the calculation should be properties that are equal to or higher in the object hierarchy than the property used for user set averaging. Choosing dimensions lower on the hierarchy can lead to unpredictable results. i

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Measures

Measures are the properties that are actually counted in the calculation, such as the number of visits or the total duration of all requests. A calculation must contain at least one measure. Different measures can have their own filters applied to them in addition to any filters applied to the calculation. All of the measure properties can be found in the tree under the Basis tab grouped by the root objects that they apply to.

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Measure Properties: The Details Tab

The Details tab reveals certain options that allow you to format exactly how the measure will be calculated and displayed.

A measure can be averaged over a time period and/or a user set. The time period averaging will take the measure and divide it by the number of the time periods that are being analyzed. Normalization also takes place, so if your data includes two weeks in August it will be averaged as though the entire month was included. User set averaging involves dividing the measure by some other measure property that is equal or higher on the object hierarchy. For example, you could have visit duration averaged per visit, per user, or per organization.

The Presentation options affect how the value for that measure will be displayed. A measure can be displayed normally; as a running total in row or column; or as a percent of row, column, calculation total, or total. At the end of the table, you can also choose to have an aggregate for the measure. This can be the average, the minimum, the maximum, the median, or the total. i

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Measure Properties: The Filters Tab

The Filter tab enables you to apply a filter specifically to one measure in a calculation. This tab is the same as the one for a calculation, with a window containing the aggregate of all parent filters that will be applied to this measure, and a box for this measure’s specific filter. Any filter that could be used at the section or calculation level can be applied to a measure. This option can be useful if, for example, you wish to have a measure that is the number of requests last week alongside another measure with the number of requests all month.

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Dimensions as Measures

Just as any measure property can be used as a dimension, any dimension property can be used as a measure.

Dimension properties can be used as measures in any one of three ways:

• Unique count This creates a measure which is the count of the number of unique dimension items that exist (grouped by whatever actual dimensions you define). For example, choosing file name as a unique count will give you the number of unique file names.
• Maximum This will cause the program to insert an actual dimension value in the cell rather than a number amount. This value refers to the dimension item which had the highest value based on the first non-dimension measure. For example, a maximum hour dimension as measure in a calculation with another measure of number of requests will output the hour with the most requests.
• Minimum This functions the same way as maximum, but outputs the item with the lowest value for the first non-dimension measure. For example, choosing minimum with file name as a dimension as measure in a calculation with another measure of number of requests will give the file name with the fewest number of requests.

Note
Unlike measures as dimensions, the minimum and maximum options actually require another measure to be part of the calculation.

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The Relationship Between Dimension and Filter

If you set a request property as a row dimension and then specify a filter criterion that includes a visit property, then you’re counting all requests from visits that met that filter. For example, if requests is the measure, file name is the row dimension, and the filter is Browser=Microsoft*, you get the number of requests made by a Microsoft browser for each file.

However, if a visit property is your row dimension and you then specify a filter criterion that includes a request property, then you’re only counting visits which include a file meeting that filter criterion. For example, if you count requests with referring URL as a row dimension and File=/order.html as a filter, you calculate the top referring URL that delivered people to your order page. Of course, counting the number of requests might not be optimal, since the order page might be requested twice in the same visit. So the best way to create this calculation is to set number of visits as the measure.

The relationship of dimension to filter is consistent when looking up or down the object hierarchy. For example, looking down the object hierarchy:

• A user property for the row dimension, with a request and/or visit property in the Filter criteria, includes only those users who had at least one visit that met the visit property and/or one request that met the request property.
• An organization property for the row dimension, with a request and/or visit and/or a user property in the Filter criteria, includes only those organizations that had at least one user who met the user property and/or who had at least one visit that met the visit property and/or one request that met the request property.

Looking up the object hierarchy:

• A request property as a dimension, with a visit, user, or organization property within the filter criteria, counts all requests from visits, users, or organizations that met the filter criteria.
• A visit property as a dimension, with a user, or organization property within the filter, counts all requests from users or organization that met the filter criteria.
• A user property as a dimension, with an organization property within the filter criteria, counts all requests from organizations that met the filter criteria.

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Calculation Property Examples

For your reference, several example questions are listed below, along with the corresponding measures and dimensions requiremed to answer the question. The standard analysis files included with Site Server Express Analysis are another excellent reference to calculation property combinations. Just open these files, double-click the individual calculation properties, and view settings that achieve the calculations found within the standard reports.

• What were our top documents by number of requests for that document?

• What were our top documents by number of visits that included the document?

• What were our top content directories by number of visits that requested content from that directory?

• What were our top content sub-directories, within the entertainment area of the site, by number of requests that requested content in that directory?

• Which registered users requested the most documents in those directories?

• For the unregistered users, which organizations requested the most documents in those directories?

• How does the number of requests per visit to each content directory differ by the browser the user is using?

• What is the average visit duration?

• How many requests per visit were made by visitors that requested the order page?

• What path did visitors take through our site?

• What path did visitors take to get to our order page?

• How many requests for the catalog form were made by visits that included that catalog form?

• How does average visit duration differ by organization type?

• Which users spent the most time reading the user’s guide?

• How many requests for Java content were made by non-Netscape browsers?

• What percent of our users have browsers that support secure transactions for credit card processing?

• How many different people from Swampscott, MA clicked on our banner on Bill’s site, came through Melinda’s web browser, downloaded our restaurant menu, returned to our site, and then ordered lasagna?

• For all users whose first visit came from our advertisement on InfoSeek during the month of January, how many have requested our order page?

• What were the top referring URLs for visits that requested our order page?

• What did the first visitor from Intersé Corporation request from our site?

• What did the first user to register at our site from Intersé request on their last visit?

• In what month did we have the most new users from Korea?

• What is the trend over the last 10 days in requests for a file X ?

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Presentations

Presentations establish the output of your reports. They take the form either of a graph or a table, each with an appropriate icon. They are set in the hierarchy at the level of the calculation, so that you can customize the look and format of your reports for each actual analysis you make. You are also free to add multiple graphs or tables to a calculation, which gives you enormous flexibility in representing your results.

The two types of presentation, tables and graphs, can both be modified for content (the elements they display) and for design (their color, look, and form). Settings for individual tables or graphs are made whenever a presentation is added to an analysis, or the settings can be edited by right-clicking a table or graph icon and selecting Edit.

Note
General settings that apply to all graphs and tables are selected through Options on the Tools menu. i

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Table Properties: The Design Tab

The figure above shows the Details tab of the Table properties sheet. Using this tab, you can customize the design of your table by selecting fonts, colors, layout, and so on.

The upper half of the tab lists all table elements in their standard diagrammatic format. The lower half provides a way to alter text properties, table cell properties, and table gridlines. To edit the text properties for a particular table element, select the table element in the upper half of the tab by single clicking the box containing the label for that element. Then, proceed to change one or more of the following font-related options: type (Arial, Times Roman, and so on.), size of font, style of font (bold, italic), or color of font.

You may also choose whether or not to display the table element in the table. In the table cell properties box, if you check Visible, the table element that is selected in the upper half of the tab will be displayed. The color option selects the background color for the table element.

Finally, the Table Gridlines box contains an option that affects the entire table layout. If Visible is checked, the table will be displayed with gridlines. Otherwise, the table will display table element labels and measure values without separating lines.

The figure below represents more precisely the layout of the elements in a typical table found in any of the standard reports.

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Table Properties: The Details Tab

The Details tab contains several options that impact the contents and layout of your table. The top box on this tab, Document titles, is only relevant to tables that contain "Title" as a row or column dimension. Within this box, selecting the top option indicates that you want to view document titles in your table. Document titles are found by running the HTML title lookup utility from Usage Import. If the document title is not available, then the file name will be displayed. The second option is to display both title (again, if available) and file name.

The middle box allows you to set the way measures are displayed in the table. Measure labels and values can either be shown in rows or columns. The default value is to show them in columns.

The last box on this tab controls the size of the outputted table. By default, a table can have no more than 500 rows and 50 columns. i

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Table Properties: The Templates Tab

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