[SOLVED] Event on certain number of pageviews

[dhorn]

I am helping develop for a website that wants a pop-in (displays a hidden div) to occur every certain number of pageviews or on a special time limit. Here is my question:

 

Would the best way to do this be connecting to sql and incrementing a value each time the page loads, then checking if it's divisble by 100 or something?

 

Or is there a better way to do this? I'm also open to other methods to make it random and not bug the hell out of people.

 

Thanks

 

Dan

[gijew]

I would say it depends on how many hits you're getting. If you're getting 100,000 hits a day that's a lot on a database for a popup. I'd say use a cookie.

 

Create / update a cookie for each page load. When the cookie reads (x) you do your magic and you reset the cookie counter, etc.

[rhodesa]

is the count per user, or across the entire site?

[dhorn]

It's across the entire site. So every certain number of pageviews from different people, the survey will pop-in.  If my understanding of cookies is correct, they are stored locally, so that wouldn't work. I need a way to increment something serverside to keep track of how many people have used it.

 

There is no way it's going to get 100,000 hits a day either. More like... a few hundred. Any suggestions on the best method to perform this?

[rhodesa]

i would use MySQL. but the way i would do the check is not in the script of the page that is loading. since you are already doing a pop-in, which will require javascript, use a script include to a PHP page. have that page add a row to a MySQL table with an auto increment field in it. then, use mysql_insert_id to get that value. finally, run a delete to remove any rows that are less then that id. then, use whatever formula you want to determine if this person should get the pop-in. if so, return the JS code needed to show the pop-in.

 

the key to this is to do all this mysql/php code in a separate file. this way it won't affect the loading time of your page. does that make sense?

[dhorn]

I think I follow what your saying, but I thought of a different method that doesn't involve mysql. I am just going to use the PHP random number generator function to generate a number say 1-5, then only when it equals 5 will the popup display. It may not be as exact as using mysql, but the survey isn't all that important.

 

Thank you for the help though

 

Dan