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--- a_simple_php_sqlite_download_counter [2020/06/27 21:09] – waxphilosophic
+++ a_simple_php_sqlite_download_counter [2020/06/27 21:24] (current) – [Summary] waxphilosophic
@@ Line 3: / Line 3: @@
 ===== Summary =====
-If you host downloadable content on SDF, you may want to get an idea of how many people have downloaded things and which are the most popular. In this tutorial, I will focus on an example of tracking PDF formatted ebooks. After completing this tutorial, you should be able to modify things to suit your needs, even if your downloads are not ebooks. You will need to have PHP access to do this, so check your membership level before you get started.
+If you host downloadable web content on SDF, you may want to get an idea of how many people have downloaded things and which are the most popular. In this tutorial, I will focus on an example of tracking PDF formatted ebooks. After completing this tutorial, you should be able to modify things to suit your needs, even if your downloads are not ebooks. You will need to have PHP access to do this, so check your membership level before you get started.
 ===== The Download Script =====
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 ===== Database Management =====
+The more downloads there are from your site, the more the download.sl3 file will grow. My assumptions have always been for a low volume of traffic and we're not storing a ton of information. My experience with tracking my own downloads is that I only need to prune one or two times a year. Most of that is removing ebook titles that I have removed.
+There is no fancy PHP page for database pruning. It can be done with the ''sqlite3'' command-line tool and a little research on SQL where clauses.
+SQLite also has the advantage that it will assign each row an index number. This is normally hidden from queries, but can be seen with the statement, "SELECT rowid,* FROM tally;"
+Even if you're not a SQL expert, you can prune by simply picking a rowid and delete everything before it. "DELETE FROM tally WHERE rowid<100" will purge everything from 1 to 99. You get the idea.
+===== Go Forth and Conquer =====
+Now that you know what people are downloading from your site, you'll have better insight into what's popular and what's not.
+It's your call, but I like to let people know I'm tracking downloads. Even though I'm not gathering any personal information with it, I like to be transparent about it. I put it in a privacy statement on my site and even offer a link to the PHP query that shows what's been downloaded.