System requirements:

• A Web Server which must have access to log file had to analyse
• PERL

Steps for installing awstats

• Download the latest stable awstat source code (tar.gz) from:

  http://sourceforge.net/projects/awstats/files/

  and save it in a folder (i.e. /home/awstats)

• Go in the /home/awstat folder and uncompress the tar.gz file with the following command:
  #tar xvf awstats-6.9.tar.gz

• After the decompression move the folder awstats-version in /var/www/html folder with the command:
  #mv awstats-version /var/www/html/awstats

• go in the var/www/html/awstats/tools folder and type the following command:
  #perl awstats_configure.pl

• Setup steps (the installation will ask for the following directives):
  • Do you want to continue setup from this standard directory [yN]?
    Type y and press enter to install in the /var/www/html folder
  • Enter full config file path of your web server.
    Type none and press enter
  • Do you want me to build a new AWStats config/profile file [y/N]
    Type y and press enter
  • What is the name of your web site or profile analysis?
    Type the name of the website you want to analyze (ServerName) and press enter
  • In which directory do you plan to store your config file(s)?
    Press enter to use the default one (etc/awstats)
  • Press enter until you return to shell prompt

• Create a folder in which store the log file you want to analyze:
  #mkdir /etc/awstats/log_servername
  
• Copy the log file from the server in which are stored the apache access_log:
  #scp root@ip_remote_server:/folderInWhichIsStoredAccessLog /etc/awstats/log
  (i.e. #scp root@ip-remote-server:/var/log/apache2/access_log /etc/awstats/log)

• The system will ask for a password; insert the root password of the remote host.
• Edit the config file in /etc/awstats (in this case we create the mysite.conf file) with vi:
  vi mysite.conf

• Go in the LogFile option and edit it to setup the right logfile that awstats has to analyze:
  LogFile = “/etc/awstats/access_log”
• Create the folder /var/lib/awstats
  #mkdir /var/lib/awstats
• Set the permissions in the folders created for apache:
  #chown -R apache.apache /var/lib/awstats
  #chown -R apache.apache /etc/awstats
  #chown -R apache.apache /var/www/html/awstats
  (If SELinux activated execute the following 2 commands)
  #chcon -R -h -t httpd_sys_content_t /var/www/html/awstats/
  #chcon -R -h -t httpd_sys_content_t /var/lib/awstats/
• go in /var/www/html/awstats/wwwroot/cgi-bin/ and type
  #perl awstats.pl -config=mysite-update
• restart apache:
  #service httpd restart
• Access from the browser the awstats statistics typing in the address bar:
  localhost/awstats/awstats.pl?config=mysite

Notes for old log file:

A fresh awstats installation will not provide full statistics history but there is a way thank to which users could set up awstats to allow a full history statistics (previous log files must be available)

How load previous log file

(Usually previous log files are available in a compress format; in this case for the remote-host we suppose to have a bz2 file extension for old files)

• Copy the access_log.bz2 from the remote host to the local host running the command:
  #scp root@remote-server:/var/log/apache2/access_log-*.bz2 /etc/awstats/log
• Go in the following folder:
  #cd /var/www/html/awstats/tools
• Type:
  #perl logresolvemerge.pl /folder/access_log-*.* > /folder/access_log
• Run the command to update the log file awstats use to make the statistics:
  cd /var/www/html/awstats/wwwroot/cgi-bin/
  #perl awstats.pl -config=mysite -update

Note for access_log automatic update

In order to have an automatic update of the log file which resides in the remote host we set up a cron job which will update our local log file which resides in the /etc/awstats/log folder.

To accomplish this work we must avoid the password request in ssh setting up the private-public keys security.

Setup SSH without password

• In the localhost run ssh-keygen
• Write the folder in which save the key: /root/.ssh/id_rsa
• Rename id_rsa.pub:
  #mv /root/.ssh/id_rsa.pub /root/.ssh/redhat.pub
• Run:
  scp /root/.ssh/id_rsa root@remote-server:/root/.ssh/
• Access remote server in ssh
• Go in the .ssh folder
  #cd /root/.ssh
• Type
  #cat redhat.pub >> authorized_keys
• Run the command:
  #service sshd restart

After this setup the connection with the host will be without password

Updating access_log with  crontab

#crontab -e

10 9 * * * scp root@remote-host:/var/log/apache2/access_log /etc/awstats/log

11 9 * * * /usr/local/awstats/wwwroot/cgi-bin/awstats.pl -config=mysite –update

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