Planning an Installation

Decide on a configuration. The first decision you need to make is which configuration of SurfStatsLive will fit the needs of your organization. The SurfStatsLive as a Service page lists the possible configurations of a SurfStatsLive installation. Please note that nowhere during the installation of SurfStatsLive or afterwards are you prompted for an installation type, it is only a logical distinction, based on the way SurfStatsLive is used. One installation of SurfStatsLive can also act as more than one configuration type. The type of configuration you would choose would depend on the answers to the following questions:

• Do you have direct access to the log files of the content web server(s)? If you do have direct access then the Single Server Configuration or Multi Server Configuration will probably be the best solution as it requires the least amount of administration. If you do not have direct access to the log files then the Statistics Bureau Configuration is the only possible configuration. The Statistics Bureau Configuration requires JavaScript redirect code in the web pages of the content web server(s).
• How busy is the content web server(s) especially in terms of CPU usage? This would influence your decision between running SurfStatsLive on the content web server (Single Server Configuration) or on a separate web server (Multi Server Configuration). SurfStatsLive was primarily designed to run on a content web server, utilizing server resources effectively, so in most cases a Single Server Configuration would be the best solution.
• How busy is the network on which the content web servers are located? If you decide to run a Multi Server Configuration network traffic between the content web server(s) and the web server running SurfStatsLive will increase. Normally this shouldn't present much of a problem as most network trafic would be between web browsing clients on the Internet and the content web server(s) and not on the internal network (LAN).
• Are the content web servers or some of the content web servers running in a clustered configuration? If you have this scenario then it is best to run a Multi Server Configuration, specifying multiple log sources for one site profile. You can also run the SurfStatsLive Service on one of the cluster servers.

Accessing the SurfStatsLive Reporting Service. Clients of the SurfStatsLive Reporting Service would need to access the SurfStatsLive Service with a web browser on a specific Virtual Web Server. This means that you would need to have an IP address and TCP/IP port number available. It is probably best (but not essential) to register a domain or subdomain where users will access the SurfStatsLive Service. Alternatively you can access the SurfStatsLive Service from a virtual directory of an existing Virtual Web Server that you have already configured. This configuration is done in the SurfStatsLive Global Setup application.

Administration Roles. SurfStatsLive provides three types of users (SurfStatsLive users, Profile Administrators and Server Administrators), two of these user types (Server Administrators and Profile Administrators) fulfil administrative roles. The role of Server Administrators will most likely be performed by one or more users in your organization. The role of Profile Administrators can either be performed by users in your organization or by your clients themselves. You would need to determine which users will perform which roles.

Authentication Provider. Server Administrators can be validated by the local Windows user (SAM) database on the server running SurfStatsLive or by a Windows 2000 domain. You would need to choose which of the two (SAM or domain) will authenticate Server Administrators. This configuration is done in the SurfStatsLive Global Setup application.