UKOLN Auditing and Monitoring Your Web Site


A 90 minute workshop session on Auditing and Monitoring Your Web Site was given on Wednesday 5th September 2001 at the JANET User Support Workshop held at the University of Loughborough on 4-6th September 2001.

Auditing and Monitoring Your Web Site


Abstract

We all provide Web sites. But how many of us check our Web site to see if it is working correctly? Is our Web site accessible? How easy is the Web site to find using search engines? How does it compare with other institutions? In this hands-on workshop session delegates will use a variety of freely-available Web-based tools to give a health-check to their Web site and compare their Web site with other institutions.

Having reviewed their own Web sites participants will then discussion the implications of the findings, the survey methodology and make plans for follow-up actions for when they return to work.


Draft Timetable

The following timetable is subject to change.

Time Topic Comments
11:00 Introduction Session aims, introduction from facilitator
11:10 Introduction to Evaluating your Web Site Quick look at the tools you will be using and an introduction to qualities of measurement
11:15 Hands on Exercises Hands-on exercise in which participants evaluate their own institutional Web site
12:00 Report back Participants report back, benchmarking of everyone's Web site
12:15 Benchmarking Issues Slides on issues that have arisen
12:20 Final Discussion and conclusions Group discussion on the benchmarking results, completion of the report back slides.

Materials

Slides
[HTML Format] - [Powerpoint 97/2000 Format]
Exercises
[HTML Format] - [MS Word 97/2000 Format]

URLs Used During Workshop

The following URLs will be used during the workshop.

Exercise Service URL
1.1 NetMechanic <http://www.netmechanic.com/toolbox/html-code.htm>
1.2 Bobby <http://www.cast.org/bobby/>
1.5 UK University Web Entry Points <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/site-rolling-demos/universities/>
2.3 W3C HTML Validation Service <http://validator.w3.org/>
2.5 Web Stress <http://www.web-server-tools.com/tools/WebStress/>
2.6 Link Alarm <http://www.linkalarm.com/>
3.1 Link Popularity <http://www.linkpopularity.com/>
3.4 Statistics <http://www.cultivate-int.org/>
4.2 Browser Emulators <http://www.dejavu.org/>

Other URLs

The following URLs may also be useful.

Browser Extensions

  Service URL
  Bookmarklets <http://www.bookmarklets.com/>
  Cacheability Engine <http://www.ircache.net/cgi-bin/cacheability.py?action=show_ext>
  Extending Your Browser <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue19/web-focus/>
  WebWatch Services <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/webwatch/services/>

Checking Web Site Performance

  EchoEcho <http://www.echoecho.com/>
  Entuity <http://www.entuity.com/>
  e-TEST Suite <http://www.rswsoftware.com/>
  Freshwater's SiteScope <http://www.freshwater.com/SiteScope.htm>
  Keynote Systems <http://www.keynote.com/iw.html>
  MercuryInteractive <http://www.mercuryinteractive.com/>
  MercuryInteractive <http://www-heva.mercuryinteractive.com/>
  Prutsman <http://www.prutsman.com/>
  Servicemetrics <http://www.servicemetrics.com/>
  Somix <http://www.somix.com/>

Evaluating Different Browsers

  Anybrowser <http://www.anybrowser.com/>
  DejaVu (Browser Emulators) <http://www.dejavu.org/>
  Evolt.org (archive of old browsers) <http://browsers.evolt.org/>
  Lynx <http://www.slcc.edu/webguide/lynxit.html> (No longer available)
  Wapilizer <http://www.gelon.net/>

Evaluating Link and Search Engine Popularity

  AltaVista <http://www.altavista.com/>
  LinkPopularity <http://www.linkpopularity.com/>
  NetMechanic <http://www.netmechanic.com/powerpack/tracker.htm#free>
  Searchenginewatch's Guidelines I <http://searchenginewatch.com/webmasters/checkurl.html>
  Searchenginewatch's Guidelines II <http://searchenginewatch.com/webmasters/popularity.html>

Evaluating Site Accessibility

  Bobby <http://www.cast.org/bobby/>
  Color Readability Test <http://snow.utoronto.ca/readtest/>
  WAVE <http://zing.ncsl.nist.gov/webmet/>
  Wave 2.01 <http://www.temple.edu/inst_disabilities/piat/wave>
  Vischeck <http://vischeck.com/vischeckURL.php3>
  Web Accessibility <http://www.w3.org/WAI/report/>

Evaluating Your Organisational Home Page

Dr HTML <http://www2.imagiware.com/RxHTML/>
NetMechanic <http://www.netmechanic.com/>
WebSiteGarage <http://websitegarage.netscape.com/>
InternetSeer <http://www.internetseer.com/>
NetMechanic Monitoring Service <http://www.netmechanic.com/monitor.htm>
Watchdog <http://watchdog.mycomputer.com/>
Alertsite <http://alertsite.com/freetrial/>
WebWatch Services <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/webwatch/services/>
Dr Watson <http://watson.addy.com/>
LinkAlarm <http://www.linkalarm.com/>
NetMechanic Maintenance Service <http://www.netmechanic.com/maintain.htm>
SiteValet <http://valet.webthing.com/>
This Old Mouse <http://www.thisoldmouse.com/>

Link Checker

Linkguard <http://www.linkguard.com/>
Netmechanic <http://www.netmechanic.com/>
Nodeworks <http://www.nodeworks.com/>
Site valet <http://valet.webthing.com/>
Xenu <http://home.snafu.de/tilman/xenulink.html>
LinkTool <http://www.linktool.com/>
Usable Web <http://usableweb.com/topics/000811-0-0.html>

Realtime Monitoring

Software in Use: <http://www.exploit-lib.org/issue5/software-used/>

Next Generation Validation Tools

Freshwater Software <http://www.freshtech.com/>
Web Criteria <http://www.webcriteria.com/>
WebKing <http://www.thewebking.com/products/webking/>

WebWatch

A Survey Of Links to UK University Web Sites <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue23/web-watch/>
A Survey Of Numbers of UK University Web Servers <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue24/web-watch/>
A Survey Of Web Server Software Used In UK University Web Sites <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue25/web-watch/>
Showing Robots the Door <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue15/robots/>
UK University Search Engines <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue21/webwatch/>
Web Watch: 404s - What's Missing? <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue20/404/>
WebWatching UK Universities and Colleges <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue12/web-focus/>
What's Related To My Web Site? <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue27/web-watch/>

Rolling Demonstrations

Rolling Demonstration of UK University Web Entry Points <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/site-rolling-demos/universities/>
Rolling Demonstration of UK University 404 Error Pages <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/site-rolling-demos/university-404-pages/>