Visitor Origin Database

Starting at V7.0 SurfStats Website Analytics provides four methods to provide enhanced visitor origin information:

• IP Country Database. A local database of which IP address ranges belongs to which countries is used to determine the country the visitor originates from.
• IP Ranges. A database with start and end IP addresses (ranges). After installation this list is empty, but the end user can add his/her own ranges. Useful for local Intranet addresses.
• Reverse DNS (RDNS) Lookups. RDNS lookups can be performed by clicking Automatic lookup of DNS names before report generation or after report generation by selecting Resolve DNS from the Edit menu. Reverse DNS lookups can be quite resource intensive and its effectiveness is dependant on whether a pointer (PTR) DNS record for the specific IP address exists on the DNS server (or referred DNS server) the RDNS lookup is requested from or not. In our experience we have found that a RDNS lookup can determine the associated domain name of the IP address in about 40% of cases.
• Visitor Origin Database. The local Visitor Origin Database contains organization/ISP information for IP address ranges. This database is available separately from SurfStats (30 MB compressed file) and registered per machine at an additional cost. The Visitor Origin Database was created by performing Whois queries at organizations that issue IP addresses. Whois queries are probably the most accurate way to determine visitor origin information. To install the Visitor Origin Database you would need to do the following after SurfStats Log Analyzer itself is registered and you have purchased a license for the visitor origin database from SurfStats.
1. Stop the SurfStats Scheduler Service from Service Options in SurfStats Website Analytics (if it is running). This can also be done from the Windows Control Panel. Close SurfStats Website Analytics if it is running.
2. Install the visitor origin database to the folder where SurfStats Website Analytics is installed and register the IP address database from Help - Register Database in SurfStats Website Analytics.
3. Start the SurfStats Scheduler Service from Service Options.
4. Regenerate reports for your site profiles.

Please see the page for the Visitor Origin Database for SurfStatsLive on how to use the database if both SurfStats Website Analytics and SurfStatsLive is installed on the computer.