Monthly Log Rotation System

Each domain hosted by us has its own log directory that contains symbolic links to that domain's log files and usage report. To preserve hard disk space, we clear out the log files at the end of each month. We place a compressed copy of the log file in your log directory for you to download and/or delete at your discretion.  NOTE- Should server space become limited, we may be forced to delete prior month's compressed logs. In any event, the compressed logs will remain for at least one month. We recommend downloading the compressed data as soon as possible.

You can view the logs via web browser. For example, entering the following in your browser:

    http://yourdomain.com/logs/

will present you with a list similar to:

or

If you left-click on usage.html, you will be presented with a usage report, discussed in greater detail on our faq.

If you right-click on the yourdomain.log2 or mtd.log file and choose "save target as:" or "save link as:", you can download the file via an http process. This file holds you stats from the beginning of the month up to today. The yourdomain.log or today.log files contain just the stats since midnight. You can also FTP into your site and change directory to:

    /mnt/web/guide/yourdomain/logs/

to download the files via FTP.

On the first of each month, the server will make a compressed copy of your .log2 file in your own logs directory and then remove the .log2 file from ours. Prior to November, 1998 the compressed copy will be named according to the date. For example, on the first of April, you will find a file named: Apr11998.log.gz in your logs directory.  The server will also create a copy of that day's usage.html file and name it according to the date as well (e.g. Apr11998.html). It can be viewed or copied via your browser. Starting in November, 1998  the compressed log file and the usage report will be named for the month that they cover. For example, on November 1st, you will find files named thusly:

Oct98.html
Oct98.log.gz 

This (date).log.gz file can be expanded using winzip after downloading. You can then use a log analyzer on it if you require more detailed statistics than provided by the Analog program that creates your usage.html file. We recommend WebTrends and discuss this more thoroughly on our faq.

The greatest benefit provided by this new system is that the customer will no longer be charged for the disk space used by the log files. Another benefit is that your usage.html page will cover a more uniform and predictable time span. Our periodic log compressions previous to this left some usage.html files covering two weeks while others covered two and a half months.