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How to test licensed page views prior to applying them to a production server

Products

Webtrends Analytics 9.x
Webtrends Analytics 8.x
Webtrends Enterprise 7.x
Webtrends Professional 7.x
Webtrends Small Business 7.x

Cause

You are considering adding a new set of log files to your production server and you want to know if the current license covers the additional page views.

A Webtrends license key for the Analytics series allows for two activations, specifically, a production server and a development server for testing. It is recommended that the development server be used to test licensed page view counts.

Resolution

First, prepare the development server. If the development server has already been set up, perform the following steps to clear the license database:

On the development server only:
1. Stop all Webtrends services.
2. Back up the Webtrends system database and the storage folder. Refer to Knowledge Base article 062367 for more details.
3. Start the Webtrends MySQL or SQL Server service.
4. Go to Add/Remove Programs and completely uninstall Webtrends.
5. Reinstall Webtrends.

With the clean installation, the licensing tables in the database will now be clear and allow for testing log files to assess licensed page view counts.

The test:
6. Analyze only one log file that is average or slightly higher than average in size for what is normally analyzed on the production server. Create a data source and a profile that points to only that one log file.
7. After analysis, open a command line window, and navigate to the \Webtrends\common\lib directory.
8. Type the following command:

wtlicman -s > licoutput.txt

9. The above command will generate a file called licoutput.txt in the \lib directory. After each successive analysis, increase the number appended to the .txt file. The licensed page view count will be at the bottom in the Standard Page Views Collected section. This count will increment with each log file analyzed.

This test will show how many licensed page views will be used from each log file and projections can be made as to how this will impact page view counts on the production server and, if necessary, log files can be “scrubbed” to remove unwanted entries to reduce the number of page views used in production.

More Information

Webtrends created the SmartSource Data Collector because clients may need assistance in regulating their page views. If you are dissatisfied with the current licensed page view count returned the standard log files, or suspect there are line entries in the log file that are undesirable, it is recommended switching to the SmartSource Data Collector. This will create a separate and completely unique set of log files based on JavaScript tagging. This log file will be free of unwanted hits because the customer decides what gets tagged and this is what appears in the log files.