Web Log Analysis Research Articles

A study and comparison of multimedia Web searching: 1997–2006

AbstractSearching for multimedia is an important activity for users of Web search engines. Studying user's interactions with Web search engine multimedia buttons, including image, audio, and video, is important for the development of multimedia Web search systems. This article provides results from a Weblog analysis study of multimedia Web searching by Dogpile users in 2006. The study analyzes the (a) duration, size, and structure of Web search queries and sessions; (b) user demographics; (c) most popular multimedia Web searching terms; and (d) use of advanced Web search techniques including Boolean and natural language. The current study findings are compared with results from previous multimedia Web searching studies. The key findings are: (a) Since 1997, image search consistently is the dominant media type searched followed by audio and video; (b) multimedia search duration is still short (>50% of searching episodes are <1 min), using few search terms; (c) many multimedia searches are for information about people, especially in audio search; and (d) multimedia search has begun to shift from entertainment to other categories such as medical, sports, and technology (based on the most repeated terms). Implications for design of Web multimedia search engines are discussed.

Algorithm for Extracting Loosely Structured Data Records Through Digging Strict Patterns

Extracting loosely structured data records (LSDRs) has wide applications in many domains, such as forum pattern recognition, Weblogs data analysis, and books and news review analysis. Yet currently existing methods only work well for strongly structured data records (SDRs). In this paper, we propose to address the problem of extracting LSDRs through mining strict patterns. In our method, we utilize both content feature and tag tree feature to recognize the LSDRs, and propose a new algorithm to extract the Data Records (DRs) automatically. The experimental results demonstrate that our algorithm is able to effectively extract LSDRs with higher precision and recall.

Web Analytics: A Picture of the Academic Library Web Site User

This article describes the usefulness of Web analytics for understanding the users of an academic library Web site. Using a case study, the analysis describes how Web analytics can answer questions about Web site user behavior, including when visitors come, the duration of the visit, how they get there, the technology they use, and the most popular content using an open-source Web log analysis tool. The author offers suggestions for future research into user motivations to complement the findings possible using Web analytics.

Making Library Web Sites Usable: A LITA Guide

Making Library Web Sites Usable: A LITA Guide

Rationalising Inappropriate Behaviour at Contested Sites

This paper examines how tourists justify inappropriate behaviour at contested cultural heritage sites through an analysis of weblogs of people who climbed Uluru, Australia. The climb is increasingly seen as being inappropriate, culturally insensitive and socially unacceptable. Yet it remains open and up to 150,000 people participate each year. Park managers and traditional owners are trying to demarket it with the hope that falling consumer demand will ultimately result in its closure. The study revealed three types of climbers: those who reject the Aboriginality of the place; those with different value sets who see nothing inherently wrong with their actions; and a large group who is aware that its actions may be inappropriate and who, therefore, need to invoke some sort of neutralisation technique to rationalise their decision. This latter group is more likely to respond to behaviour modification messages and should be the main target of future demarketing activities.

Creating meaningful data from web logs for improving the impressiveness of a website by using path analysis method

Web usage mining is to analyze web log files to discover user accessing patterns of web pages. In order to effectively manage and report on a website, it is necessary to get feedback about activity on the web servers. The aim of this study is to help the web designer and web administrator to improve the impressiveness of a website by determining occurred link connections on the website. Therefore, web log files are pre-processed and then path analysis technique is used to investigate the URL information concerning access to electronic sources. The proposed methodology is applied to the web log files in the web server of Firat University. The results and findings of this experimental study can be used by the web designer in order to plan the upgrading and enhancement to the website.

Rationalising Inappropriate Behaviour at Contested Sites

This paper examines how tourists justify inappropriate behaviour at contested cultural heritage sites through an analysis of weblogs of people who climbed Uluru, Australia. The climb is increasingly seen as being inappropriate, culturally insensitive and socially unacceptable. Yet it remains open and up to 150,000 people participate each year. Park managers and traditional owners are trying to demarket it with the hope that falling consumer demand will ultimately result in its closure. The study revealed three types of climbers: those who reject the Aboriginality of the place; those with different value sets who see nothing inherently wrong with their actions; and a large group who is aware that its actions may be inappropriate and who, therefore, need to invoke some sort of neutralisation technique to rationalise their decision. This latter group is more likely to respond to behaviour modification messages and should be the main target of future demarketing activities.

SOM(Self-Organizing Map)을 이용한 대용량 웹 서비스 DoS 공격 탐지 기법

웹 서비스는 개방형 서비스로 정보 공유가 주요 목적이다. 하지만 상대적으로 웹 서비스에 대한 공격 및 해킹 사고 또한 급증하고 있다. 현재 웹 해킹 등의 공격을 탐지하기 위해서는 웹 로그의 분석을 통해 우선적으로 수행 가능하며 중요한 역할을 수행하고 있다. 실제 웹 로그 분석을 통해 웹 서비스의 취약점을 분석하고 보완하는 사례가 늘어나고 있다. 이에 본 연구에서는 대용량의 웹 로그 정보에 대해 SOM 알고리즘을 적용하여 웹 DoS 공격 등과 같은 웹 서비스에서의 이상 탐지를 수행하였다. 구체적으로 대용량 웹 로그 정보에 대해 SOM 기반으로 BMU(Best Matching Unit)의 발생 빈도를 조사해 발생 빈도가 가장 높은 유닛을 이상(Abnormal) 유닛으로 판단하여 입력된 웹 로그 데이터에 대한 DoS 공격 탐지 성능을 향상시킬 수 있었다. Web-services have originally been devised to share information as open services. In connection with it, hacking incidents have surged. Currently, Web-log analysis plays a crucial clue role in detecting Web-hacking. A growing number of cases are really related to perceiving and improving the weakness of Web-services based on Web-log analysis. Such as this, Web-log analysis plays a central role in finding out problems that Web has. Hence, Our research thesis suggests Web-DoS-hacking detective technique In the process of detecting such problems through SOM algorithm, the emergence frequency of BMU(Best Matching Unit) was studied, assuming the unit with the highest emergence frequency, as abnormal, and the problem- detection technique was recommended through the comparison of what's called BMU as input data.

Blogging PR: An exploratory analysis of public relations weblogs

Although there are ever more weblogs on the Internet, this is an area that has been little researched in public relations, and where they have been analyzed it has been as a tool for communication rather than a primary information source in the public relations body of knowledge. This paper provides an exploratory study of the structure and content of 67 blogs on public relations to determine what issues they deal with and whether they are a tool for the theoretical development of the field. In addition to their content we have looked at the structure, usability and interactivity of the blogs.

조직내 지식창출을 위한 웹블로그 장르분석의 유용성 발굴: 기술의 사회구성론적 관점

The purpose of this paper is to identify the usefulness of Weblog genre analysis in knowledge creation within an organization where communications are occurred frequently among the employees with information and communication technologies (ICTs). Knowledge creation is essential to achieve competitive advantage in today’s knowledge-oriented working environments. There has been huge investment on knowledge management systems to achieve such advantages. It is, however, widely recognized that distributed knowledge management systems often fail due to the different social contexts across the sub-organizations where the local information systems are deployed. It is important to coordinate such social gaps across the sub-organizations to achieve better advantages. Given that Weblogs users often feel a shared social norm, Weblogs play a positive role of narrowing the social gaps. This paper argues that the genre analysis of Weblogs could provide important clues to narrow the social gaps existed across the sub-organizations within an organization. Hence, such taxonomical practice may be a solution for the high rate of failure in knowledge management system implementations in an organization. This paper uses the theory of organizational knowledge creation (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995) and social construction of technology (SCOT) approach (Bijker, 1995) to compare the socialized with the non-socialized integration of distributed information systems. The findings of this research provide a useful framework for better implementing knowledge management practices especially in distributed working environments.

Adaptive web presence and evolution through web log analysis

With the rapid growth of the World Wide Web and the intensified competition among the businesses, effective web presence is critical to attract potential customers and retain current customers thus to the success of the business. This paper presents a framework to establish adaptive web presence and evolution through web log analysis. Some simple yet effective descriptive statistical techniques are used to reveal the relationship between the web traffic workload and a few factors such as the domains names and geographic locations. Correspondence analysis is explored to further unveil the patterns between the web workload and user groups. We find that the power law distribution can be applied to model the web traffic. These regularities and patterns shed light on how to design a better web and enhance its performance. The implications of applying these findings to e-commerce and other websites are discussed.

Data mining of search engine logs

This article reports on the development of a novel method for the analysis of Web logs. The method uses techniques that look for similarities between queries and identify sequences of query transfo...

Data mining of search engine logs

AbstractThis article reports on the development of a novel method for the analysis of Web logs. The method uses techniques that look for similarities between queries and identify sequences of “query transformation”. It allows sequences of query transformations to be represented as graphical networks, thereby giving a richer view of search behavior than is possible with the usual sequential descriptions. We also perform a basic analysis to study the correlations between observed transformation codes, with results that appear to show evidence of behavior habits. The method was developed using transaction logs from the Excite search engine to provide a tool for an ongoing research project that is endeavoring to develop a greater understanding of Web‐based searching by the general public.

In this issue

In this issue

데이터웹하우스 시스템에서 메타데이터 스키마의 설계 및 활용

고객관리에 중요한 정보로 활용되는 웹로그 분석과 의사결정을 지원하기 위한 데이터웨어하우스를 결합하여 데이터웹하우스가 등장하였다. 그러나 시스템에 분산되어 저장된 정보를 통합하는 데이터웹하우스는 다양하고 이질적인 정보를 포함하므로 관리적 측면에서 복잡한 작업을 필요로 한다. 본 연구는 데이터웹하우스 환경에서 데이터를 효과적으로 관리하고 통합하기 위한 메타데이터 스키마를 제안한다. 제안된 스키마는 데이터웹하우스 개발을 지원하고 기업의 정보 자산에 대한 통합 관리를 가능케 한다. 또한 데이터웹하우스의 웹로그 추출을 위한 ETL 메타데이터를 사용하여 웹로그 데이터 처리시간을 향상시킬 수 있다. Datawebhouse consists of both web log analysis used for customer management and datawarehouse used for decision support. However, datawebhouse needs complex operations for management in order to transform and integrate data from heterogeneous data sources and distributed systems. We propose a metadata schema in order to enable data integration and data management which are essential in datawebhouse environments. We show that our proposed schema supports datawebhouse development and enables integrated asset management of business information. With ETL metadata for web log extract, we can improve the data processing time of web log.

A novel incremental mining algorithm of frequent patterns for web usage mining

Because data warehouse is frequently changing, incremental data leads to old knowledge which is mined formerly unavailable. In order to maintain the discovered knowledge and patterns dynamically, this study presents a novel algorithm updating for global frequent patterns-IPARUC. A rapid clustering method is introduced to divide database into n parts in IPARUC firstly, where the data are similar in the same part. Then, the nodes in the tree are adjusted dynamically in inserting process by “pruning and laying back” to keep the frequency descending order so that they can be shared to approaching optimization. Finally local frequent itemsets mined from each local dataset are merged into global frequent itemsets. The results of experimental study are very encouraging. It is obvious from experiment that IPARUC is more effective and efficient than other two contrastive methods. Furthermore, there is significant application potential to a prototype of Web log Analyzer in web usage mining that can help us to discover useful knowledge effectively, even help managers making decision.

A Web Recommendation System using Grid based Support Vector Machines

Main goal of web recommendation system is to study how user behavior on a website can be predicted by analyzing web log data which contain the visited web pages. Many researches of the web recommendation system have been studied. To construct web recommendation system, web mining is needed. Especially, web usage analysis of web mining is a tool for recommendation model. In this paper, we propose web recommendation system using grid based support vector machines for improvement of web recommendation system. To verify the performance of our system, we make experiments using the data set from our web server.

How and Why of User Studies: RLG's RedLightGreen as a Case Study

SUMMARY This article documents a lifecycle approach to employing user-centered design, covering both qualitative and quantitative data gathering methods in support of using this approach for product design, usability testing, and market research. The author provides specific case studies of usability studies, focus groups, interviews, ethnographic studies, and web log analysis. The article supplies practical advice and tools for those interested in exploring user-centered design concepts for web-based tools and services in archives, libraries, and museums.

Using the Turning Research Into Practice (TRIP) database: how do clinicians really search?

Clinicians and patients are increasingly accessing information through Internet searches. This study aimed to examine clinicians' current search behavior when using the Turning Research Into Practice (TRIP) database to examine search engine use and the ways it might be improved. A Web log analysis was undertaken of the TRIP database-a meta-search engine covering 150 health resources including MEDLINE, The Cochrane Library, and a variety of guidelines. The connectors for terms used in searches were studied, and observations were made of 9 users' search behavior when working with the TRIP database. Of 620,735 searches, most used a single term, and 12% (n = 75,947) used a Boolean operator: 11% (n = 69,006) used "AND" and 0.8% (n = 4,941) used "OR." Of the elements of a well-structured clinical question (population, intervention, comparator, and outcome), the population was most commonly used, while fewer searches included the intervention. Comparator and outcome were rarely used. Participants in the observational study were interested in learning how to formulate better searches. Web log analysis showed most searches used a single term and no Boolean operators. Observational study revealed users were interested in conducting efficient searches but did not always know how. Therefore, either better training or better search interfaces are required to assist users and enable more effective searching.

Getting to the Source: a Survey of Quantitative Data Sources Available to the Everyday Librarian: Part I: Web Server Log Analysis

This is the first part of a two-part article that provides a survey of data sources which are likely to be immediately available to the typical practitioner who wishes to engage in statistical analysis of collections and services within his or her own library. Part I outlines the data elements which can be extracted from web server logs, and discusses web log analysis tools. Part II looks at logs, reports, and data sources from proxy servers, resource vendors, link resolvers, federated search engines, institutional repositories, electronic reference services, and the integrated library system.