Open source web analytics in action (Piwik 0.6.10)

I am just about to start an Elgg-based collaboration platform (innovatenow.net).  It still require some thinking, the whole enterprise obviously begs the question why another one … one answer is the possible demise of free web 2.0 services such as Ning … or just think about the things you better keep under control yourself (managing access rights, layout, installation of helpful add ons, as well as integration with other applications such as web analytics, wikis etc.

Anyway, I was keen to see web analytics (Piwik 0.6.10)  in action –  the  ‘tracking’ is really good, quite similar to what you might know from Google analytics. It’s good to have an inkling of how your website is perceived out there  …  Even though there isn’t much on the site I could see what information would be useful in the future:

• 120 visits so far
• Visitors clicked around 5.8 times on average (that’s quite high)
• People stayed on average less than 30 secs (no wonder)
• Visitors came to the site because they were looking for “Tim’s friends” and if you Google it yourself then innovatenow.net comes up on the 5th place (which is a high ranking but not very helpful
• One site from Unisanet links to innovatenow.net (that must be my homepage)
• And we got 9 different visitors from the US and 4 from Sweden, the high number of Britons must be a mistake

And you can widgetise most of the information above, which means you can use your access statistics anywhere you like (e.g. the usual hit counter plus)

Brave new world: The Moodle/ Google Wave

Hi,

I  was looking at  Google Wavefor a different purpose  – but some people  integrate Moodle and Wave

Moodle Wave: Reinventing the VLE using Widget technologies”

Interesting to read Martin D’s comments:

“Just realised I never actually posted about Wave anywhere yet. I saw the Wave video the first day it was published and was intrigued and amazed like the rest of you. Like most truly lasting advancements, it takes a lot of ideas we are already used to and combines them in a way that is obviously better and more usable. As to how this affects learning management systems like Moodle, I don’t think it will totally replace them (as some have been saying). Moodle (and similar systems) are (like it or not!) more about the *management* of learning at a higher level than this, a system of control and authentication that supports institutional policy and practice.”

Hmm – maybe …

or

“However, what I do think will happen is that many of the activities in Moodle will be replaced by services like these. Even in the very short term I can see Waves replacing Wikis and Blogs and Forums all over the place. Not everyone will want to use Google accounts for everything, and not everyone will want to run their own wave servers, but there will be many who do.”

Yes, that would be a step into the right direction …

Cheers C