[TWIAR] Just a little random stat: TWIARTicker progress.

[Greg Williams]

In case you were wondering, (and I bet you weren't :-) ), I did a statistics
check for the TWIARTicker and this is what we have so far in the 2 months
we've run it:

31243 requests:  0.47%:   <-- this is the total number of "hits" to the
newsticker directory, which includes the text file the ticker reads from as
well as the promotional ticker on the TWIAR.org homepage.  It's only taken
up .47% of the total bandwidth on the server because the files total less
than 9 kilobytes.

news.txt:  15934 requests:  0.16%:   <-- the name of the text file that gets
the headlines.  Basically the headlines themselves have been checked 15934
times by users going out to the various websites with the ticker (currently
15 that I know of) and have gotten the latest news when the file on the page
in particular requests the headlines from TWIAR.org.  The Ticker refreshes
the headlines after cycling thru the list of headlines twice.  So if someone
stays on a particular page with the Ticker on it for some amount of time,
the ticker will re-ping the news.txt file after running the headlines twice
to check for updates.  I may alter this later since I dont update it except
on Saturday night and the occasional news flash (such as Lance Bass's flight
cancellation and his callsign issuance).  But for now, the bandwidth usage
on the server is too negligible to require having everyone change their
code.

promo.txt:  9010 requests:  0.06%:   <-- the promotional ticker file on the
TWIAR.org homepage.  This is going to be misleading because I had the file
set to refresh every single time it cycled thru the list.  I just reset it
from "1" to "10" and that should take care of the numbers...unless someone
wants to read the same thing 10 times, then read it again...  :-)

sText.class:  6237 requests:  0.24%:   <-- this is the "engine" that drives
the TWIARTicker.  This is a more accurate count of how many times the ticker
has been accessed.  It serves as the engine for both the promo.txt and
news.txt files.  It only needs accessing one time and it starts the ticker,
and the refreshing after twice running thru the headlines doesn't need to be
kickstarted by this file.

So, with all the sites running the ticker, and the promo text, and the news
text, this adds up to 31,181 'hits' to the ticker!  The reason it doesn't
add up to the number of times the directory itself was accessed is because
during the beta testing I had other file names up on the directory the
ticker is in.

Bottom line:  The headlines have been loaded up 15,934 times on the 15 sites
we have using the code!  And with the little bandwidth it takes up, again
the total server bandwidth consumption is negligible, and that is what
concerned me the most when I created this.

Another note:  I saw was that the requests for MP3 compared to Realaudio
files is roughtly 2 to 1 or 3 to 1.  Sometimes the realaudio is down by as
much 5 to 1 to MP3s.  MP3s are the ones the visitors to the site want it
appears.  The streaming realaudio is averaging about 25 requests per week
which is about in line with the RA files themselves.  MP3s are averaging
50-75 downloads per week.

I make note of this because we may have to switch our hosting provider soon
and if bandwidth is going to be an issue on a new host I will have to start
cutting corners, and I may start with RA.  I might be able to move the RA
files to other sites and simply hyperlink from the main site, but I dont
want to create more work for Dale (file guy) or myself than needs to be.  We
shouldnt have to upload to 2-3 different places to curb bandwidth.  Another
option is to cut out RealAudio entirely and/or remove the archives.

THIS IS NOT SET IN STONE!  No panic in the streets, please!  We are still
exploring our options and there is still a lot of room for leaving things
the way they are for now.

If you have any questions please email me at k4hsm@lock-net.com.

Greg Williams
TWIAR Webmaster