ssd's counter rules & documentation page

The documentation for the perl version and the c version of the counter are both here. However, please read the below rules before putting the counter in your page.

Acceptable use of my counter

These rules apply to the use of the counter on www-mae.engr.ucf.edu. Several other sites have installed my counter, and their script may still point to this page. That's fine with me, but these rules may or may not apply there.

Please don't put this counter in your page unless you are at UCF. I'll tolerate a few people using it, but if heavy access from off campus begins to cause problems, I will have to remove the counter.

If you insist on using my counter and you are off campus, then I require that

  1. your page gets fewer than 500 hits a week
  2. you do NOT advertise my counter in any way except that you must refer to this page <!-- http://www-mae.engr.ucf.edu/~ssd/counter.html --> in a comment in your page; SHOWING HOW TO USE MY COUNTER DIRECTLY IS CONSIDERED ADVERTISING. I DO NOT WANT ANYONE USING MY COUNTER UNLESS THEY HAVE SEEN THIS PAGE AND READ THESE RULES.
  3. your site must have fewer than 100 pages using my counter and get fewer than 5000 hits a week; I feel this is generous, as 50 pages IMHO justifies installing a counter server locally, and the pages at UCF get far fewer than 2000 hits per week.
  4. DontUseThisTag means don't use this tag. Don't. Get your own tag. *sheeh* some people just don't get it.
  5. If you get >1000 hits a week, and then rename your tag, I'll notice. And your counter will be violently disabled. And if you do it again, your system administrator may get mail from me.
If you violate (1), you'll probably get hate mail from me and your counter may be reset randomly on my whim. If your page gets over 1000 hits per week, your system administrator will be getting mail from me after I mail you once. The counter may also be randomly replaced with an embarrassing gif after you've gotten one warning. If you violate (2) you'll get LOTS of hate mail from me if I discover your advertisement. If you violate (3), your system administrator will be getting mail from me.

In the case of (3), IMHO there are more than enough users at your site to install the counter locally, and you should stop using my counter. If you are at such a site, and would like to try to convince your webmaster to do something, send me mail and I can provide a list of pages at your site that are using my counter. If you are a commercial internet access provider, you should install my counter rather than having your users mooch of a free site anyway.

Putting my counter in a site's top level page pretty much violates all three rules. If you have control of the top page, you are probably webmaster, and should install my counter on your system rather than loading my system down more.

I now have a script that monitors the conditions above. I will send out e-mail on a daily basis to offenders who have registered. Those who have not registered will get their counters disabled without warning.

I will be doing partial wipes of the database sporadically to see if people are still using the counter. (These wipes now affect only the URL counts and tag weekly counts as displayed by the counter status form.) Mostly, I'll be noticing people with either an excessive number of pages from the same site or an excessive number of hits on the same page. If you are either, you should either try to convince your provider to install a counter locally or remove my counter from your page.

SSD 8-Oct-95