How to check user entrance and exit URL

Question

Hi,

I've looked at a couple different analytics programs (like Google Analytics) that will tell me what URL my users have entered my site from, and which URL they are going to when they exit.

It certainly must be possible to gather this data somehow, I just can't find any code examples of how to do it. I would imagine that it involves the javascript function onBeforeLoad, I just don't know how to get the URL from that point on. This is a pretty important feature, as it will help me to tailer my website more towards my users specific needs.

I appreciate the help, Joe

Answer 1

To track the first/last page your users visit, you just track all pages the user visits, and the one with the earliest timestamp is the first, and the one with the latest timestamp is the last.

Answer 2

A simple approach would be to have a db with ip, time, lasturl and firsturl fields. Every time someone calls a page, it get's checked if his IP is already in the db. if not, a new entry gets written with firsturl as the actual url and i with his ip. Every time now he loads a new page on your site, the lastpage field gets updated. I don't know how exactly to determine that he's left the page, e.G. if he hasn't accessed any page on your sithe within 10min.

Answer 3

Sorry, I think I was unclear originally.

One of my other sites uses a service called StatCounter, and they have a section called "Came From". This shows where users were at directly before they visited your page. So, for instance, if someone google'd "Inside Out Ministry", and found the link to my site www.insideoutministry.com, my stats page would show that the user Came From www.google.com .

What would be the code to do this?