Log files presented to : Sir Adnan presented by: SHAH RUKH

Log file  A file that lists actions that have occurred. For example, Web server: maintain log files listing every request made to the server.

Some terminologies…….  Visit: Each time a specific user accesses a webpage is considered a visit. Multiple visits by a single user reflect a high degree of interest in the site content. Frequently updated and content-rich sites generate multiple visits  Session: A session includes all the activities of a user during a single website visit. Website management can benefit from knowing time, length of a session and the path that a user follows within a web site.

Cont…  Hit: The access log records each attempt to retrieve a page or file from a website. These "hits" can add up to impressive numbers but are misleading. Hit statistics include not just webpages but also graphics. Watch the visitor count and ignore the hits!  Cookie: Cookies are small data fragments left on a user's computer by a website. These "crumbs" can be used to track a complete visitor web session. With the increased reliance on all forms of electronic commerce, cookies should be the least of their worries

Personalisation  Personalisation refers to the use of technology and available customer information to tailor e-commerce interactions between a business and each individual customer  Personalisation helps to make a website more responsive to the unique and individual needs of each user

Personalisation in e-commerce  The collection of web data;  Web data pre-processing and analysis; and  Determining which actions to be taken based on the analysis results. There are three main phases that are followed in personalisation, namely

Customer Profiles  A customer profile is a snapshot of who your customers are, how to reach them and why they buy from you.  In short, a customer profile is a collection of information that describes the customer.  Customer profiles contain comprehensive information about customers ‟ demographic details, preferences, characteristics and activities

Methods used to establish customer’s profile  In explicit feedback, customers are requested to register on the website by completing on-line forms that includes biographical details such as name, age, gender, contact details and occupation  In some instances, registration continues by asking customers to complete a questionnaire that focuses on the specific customers’ preferences and may further ask customers to rate products Explicit and implicit feedbacks are two methods used by on-line businesses to establish customer profiles

Cont…  In implicit feedback, the on-line system collects user details, without the user’s explicit input and uses the details to model the user ‟ s on-line behavior or build profiles  Implicit feedback examples include; user purchasing patterns, Web page visits and web surfing paths

Updating Customer Profiles  One way is to implicitly collect customers’ browsing behavior when interacting with the website Web log files are commonly used sources of web visitors’ activities that are used to update and maintain on-line customers’ profiles As in the below figure

Cont… The main motives for having the system recording a number of user activities in a tailor-made log file were:  To avoid data pre-processing if the activities were to be collected from another log file, for example, web server log file and  To prevent users from assigning arbitrary ratings when asked explicitly to rate themselves The variables that the system recorded in the log file were used by the decision model to update individual customer profiles

User tasks in maintaining profile Two different sets of tasks  Firstly, users were asked to register and complete an on-line product knowledge questionnaire with specific questions on product categories the system caters  The product questionnaire had five general questions for each product category and five options per question from which a user had to select only one option per question. The options had a weighing attached. As show in the table below

Option weightingMeaning 1Not at all 2To some extent 3To a moderate extent 4To a larger extent 5Always

Cont…  Secondly, users were asked to perform two similar tasks to purchase specified products from each category on the on-line website. The tasks were performed in two separate sessions  The first task was performed in the first session and the second task in the second session  The system generated a separate activity log file for every user after the user had completed a session.

Decision model and Customer Profile updating:  A decision model was designed, implemented and incorporated in the on-line e-commerce website  The main purpose of the decision model was to analyse customers ‟ activities recorded in the customer log file and to update the customer profiles where necessary  The log file recorded a number of activities a customer performed during a session

Cont..  Time spent on a particular product category page;  Products browsed per category; and  Number of times asked for more information. Here we will use the following parameters from the log file were selected to be used by the decision model in making updating decisions

Cont..  Remote IP address or IP address of the client machine;  User log in name;  Time and date of requests;  Requested pages and results of requests; and  Size of data transferred. Different log files can be created for the users during browsing, for example, web server access logs, browser caches and proxy logs. Common information contained in web log files includes

Cont..  Time and Date of requests Time and date of requests show times users spend on a page before navigating to another page  Requested pages and Results Requested pages and results shows the user’s navigation pattern on the website The other web log file entries are used for purposes such as improving server performance and facilitating site modifications Two of the most commonly used web log file entries in updating customer profiles or modeling on-line user behavior are

Comparison of Customer Profiles: Initial customer profile and customer profile 1 :  Initial customer profiles were created by the system during registration. Users had to complete an on-line product knowledge questionnaire that determined the customers ‟ product knowledge level used by the on-line system to generate an initial customer profile  Customer profile 1 was generated when users completed their first task set.

Lets see the agreement Charts

Types of logs include:  Access logs  Error logs  Referrer logs  Agent logs

Cont… 1. Access logs record website visits. Most web server logs are kept in common log file format or can be converted to this format. This format makes it possible for statistics programs to analyze web site activity.

Sample log entries

Cont… 2.Error logs identify file problems such as missing files. 3.Referrer logs list the site that a user came from before accessing a particular page 4.Agent logs record the type of browser or client software used to access web pages on a particular host.

Raw log file  The wealth of data in the log files is not readily mined with the naked eye. A raw log file entry looks something like this: [19/Jul/1999:00:00: ] "GET /studio/drives.html HTTP/1.1" " "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.0; Windows XP; DigExt)"

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