In my search for a simple PHP web counter it was difficult to find one that wasn’t somehow connected to an external host and didn’t write IP addresses to a file and then use resources to search the file later.  With all the NAT firewalls out there counting visitors based on IP address just doesn’t seem like a modern thing to do. I took a script by Eric Sizemore and modified it to create my own version.  What it does is add to the visitor count (stored in a txt file on the server) if they don’t have a cookie showing that they have visited before, then i set that cookie to expire after 60 days, after that if the visitor comes again they will be counted again.  It’s not the most accurate, but gives a good idea of how many people are visiting and i wanted to reduce server file operations.

The Code

  Simple Standalone PHP Web Counter (9.6 KiB, 11 hits)

Installation & Usage

  1. Unzip the code into your website’s root folder
  2. Change permissions on the counter log txt file so that it is writable (chmod 666).
  3. Add the following PHP code at the top of each root page you would like to display the counter on:
    <?php include('counter/counter.php'); ?>
  4. Add the following PHP code where you want to have the counter display:
    <?php show_counter(); ?>
  5. Test the page you’ve included counter.php on and have show_counter() displayed.