Yesterday I started using the open source alternative to Google Analytics, Piwik (www.piwik.org) on my WordPress multisite network. Setup is fast and easy. Here are some comments on the setup steps and possible issues:
- Download the piwik zip (about 6 MB, fast);
- Upload to your browser. I placed it at
{root}/piwik.
SSH/SFTP is recommended as there are many thousands of files and it would take a long time using FTP. Make sure transfer mode is set to “binary”, because “ascii” or “auto” would result in messing up line breaks, so that you don’t pass the file integrity check of Piwik; - Creating a database is trivial. I used a separate DB that I can
DROPwhenever I get enough of Piwik; - It works pretty much out of the box. In the menu item “API” you’ll find your auth-code, that you put in the appropriate text field of the WP_piwik plugin.
Install was fast and with the WordPress plugin WP_piwik installed, tracking codes can be added automatically to all your blogs, and stats are integrated with your WordPress dashboard.
Enjoy the narcissism (or masochism) of watching your visitors come and go in real time 🙂