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:One could just as easily argue that if a page was ''not'' cached then the statistics would be skewed. If someone has already seen a page (and thus forms part of their cache) then viewing it again is not a fresh view with a fresh pair of eyes. All said and done, if everybody has the same working conditions (i.e. their wiki does perform caching) then, with regard to the wikiFactor, everybody is working on a level playing field. --[[User:Spud Gun|<b><FONT COLOR="#8B3A3A">Carl McBride</FONT></b>]] ([[User talk:Spud Gun|talk]]) 10:18, 14 August 2009 (EDT)
::There are several forms of caching that can be occur. Internally, MediaWiki (and perhaps some other engines) cache various items of data used to reconstruct a page. Busy sites often use a "front-end" cache such as [[Wikipedia:Squid (software)|Squid]] (in reverse-proxy mode) or [[Wikipedia:Varnish (software)|Varnish]] to accelerate the delivery of pages and files, shielding the web server from duplicate requests from different clients where permitted by response headers. Finally, there are the intermediary server and user caches, also advised by caching and age headers. The latter caches are the ones you refer to, but on busy sites it is probably the server-side cache for anonymous users that has the most effect on perceived popularity. Indeed, it will greatly affect the hit-count for most-accessed pages (since they are very likely to be served from cache), and so disproportionately affect wikiFactor. [[User:GreenReaper|GreenReaper]] 14:37, 11 November 2009 (EST)
:There ''is'' something that can be done - use a tool like [[Wikipedia:Google Analytics|Google Analytics]] ([[mw:{{Mw|Extension:Google Analytics Integration|extension]]}}) to track website usage. This is triggered on each access, regardless of whether a page has been served from a cache. To me, this is the right way to do it - after all, a [[citation]] is still counted even if someone copied it from another paper's list of citations. Those wikis using caching are the very ones that you would expect to have a high wikiFactor - some get hundreds or even thousands of HTTP requests a minute. [[User:GreenReaper|GreenReaper]] 14:25, 11 November 2009 (EST)
:::Interesting. I opened an account on Google Analytics, but I stalled not knowing what to do with a wiki site. Thanks for the info on the extension! --[[User:Spud Gun|<b><FONT COLOR="#8B3A3A">Carl McBride</FONT></b>]] ([[User talk:Spud Gun|talk]]) 04:56, 12 November 2009 (EST)
==Manipulation==
How easy is it for a wiki to manipulate this figure by falsifying or inflating its statistics? My concern was mainly for its inclusion as a filtering criterion per [[mw:{{Mw|Extension:InterwikiMap/Data]]}}; we could add it if there were a way to verify the figure's validity. [[User:Leucosticte|Leucosticte]] ([[User talk:Leucosticte|talk]]) 20:05, 20 November 2012 (PST)
:If they control the database, it is trivial to modify. Most larger sites will use a third-party tool like Google Analytics, and might give you access to view the account, which has greater validity - they'd have to manufacture actual visitors, which is more trouble than it is worth. [[User:GreenReaper|GreenReaper]] ([[User talk:GreenReaper|talk]]) 14:50, 2 January 2013 (PST)
::Interesting discussion. I am aware that the Special/PopularPages in [[:Category:MediaWiki|MediaWiki]] can be manipulated (as can Special/Statistics). However, it is important to note that many MediaWiki sites disable PopularPages - the most notable are also arugably the most important, those being all [[:Category:Wikimedia Foundation|Wikimedia Foundation]] wikis. It also important to note that hardly any of the other wiki engines provide page ranking reporting facilities - we have identified only [[Template:Size#Where to look|four other engines]]. Finally, we need to remember that [[WikiIndex]] is not an encyclopaedic wiki - we don't function on the same ethos as Wikipedia, we don't require any independent verification of said stats. [[User:Hoof Hearted|Sean, aka <small>Hoof Hearted</small>]] • <sub>[[:Category:Active administrators of this wiki|Admin]]</sub> • <small>[[User talk:Hoof Hearted|talk2HH]]</small> 01:22, 3 January 2013 (PST)
