I have been experimenting with creating a web counter. I created a table (I'm using SQLServer 2005) that simply contains an integer.

Right now, I increment this on the page as:

Protected Sub Page_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Me.Load
        If Not Page.IsPostBack Then
            KnightAlertBox.Visible = "true"
            WebCounter.UpdateWebCounter()
        End If
End Sub

Where WebCounter is a function I wrote to simply increment the integer value in the table.

The problem, obviously, is that anytime I click off the default.aspx page and go back, it will increment it. Is there a different event that just triggers once per "site" visit?

Suggestions?

Thanks, in advance,
Rob

Use your Global.asax file and the Session_OnStart event; place your code there. Obviously, this doesn't actually count the number of visitors to your website, it counts the number of sessions you have handled but that is going to be the best you can do without something like WebTrends to tell you unique visitors, etc. (Of course you could just write an app to parse your IIS logs to get that data if you really want it)

hth.



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The global.asax file is an optional file used by the runtime that contains a series of events related to your web application as a whole.

Somethign like this will work


<script language="vb" runat="server">
Sub Session_OnStart(sender as Object, e as EventArgs)
    WebCounter.UpdateWebCounter()
End Sub
</script>

Place it in the root of your web application. There are other events that can be in a global file but for the sake of simplicity this will do for you.

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UPDATE: Thanks for answering the previous question--I actually deleted it--as I did a bit of research and had it answered--but THANK YOU..only thing left is below:

Can someone help explain what the lifecycle of the session? Are you saying that a session could be servicing two users at the same time, thus not capturing the true amount of users? If so, how long would the "session" stay active until a new one would be generated that I would capture?

I'm quite the novice here, and not really understanding lifecycles of events.

What is the difference between session start and application start?

Thanks SO MUCH!
Rob

No, 1 session will not handle 2 different users, it is a 1 to 1 relationship. Here is what is gong to happen by placing your code in the Session_OnStart:

A user will come to your site, and a session is created for them, thus calling your code to increment your code.

Now, if a user is idle at your site for 15 minutes (This is the default timeout for sessions but you can change it), their session will timeout and die; when they make another request to the server AFTER their session has expired, a new session will be created and will call your code in the Session_OnStart event.

So, as you can see, you code is going to really increment how many sessions you application serves and not necessarily how many users have come to your site. (In the above example, the user has incremented the counter twice but only visited your site once.)

By Session Lifecycle I think you mean to say Page Life Cycle and you can read about that here:
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms178472.aspx
A session's life is present as long as the user continues to do *something* and does not become idle for a period of time that exceeds the session time out.

Application_Start fires only 1 time every time the application is started. What I mean by this is that if you bounce your WebServer and restart it, Application_Start will fire once a resource has been requested from your application and will not fire again until the application is stopped through IIS or the server is restarted as a whole.

Session_OnStart will fire every time a new user requests resources from your application.

hth.

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