How to turn on Google Analytics for your site in 2 lines of configuration: a custom IHttpModule

Note: this entry has moved.

Ok, so I got excited with Google Analytics , thanks to Scott Hanselman. So I decided to give it a quick try.

Turns out, you cannot give it a quick try unless you start changing your site's pages to include a piece of script before the </body>... yuck!

I searched the web and found no one who had done the simplest possible thing to have transparent support for Google Analytics on your site without touching a single page: a custom IHttpModule that uses the HttpResponse.Filter property to detect </body> and add the script automatically before sending the buffered output.

If your site is not a high-traffic, performance-sensitive one (i.e. your corporate site/blog/small community site), you may find this little guy useful (note that I only had about 20' to get it working ;-)). Download the module for .NET v.2.0 or the one for .NET 1.1. Configuration is mininal:

<configuration>

    <appSettings>

        <add key="GoogleAnalyticsAccount" value="[Google Analytics Account #]"/>

    </appSettings>

    <connectionStrings/>

    <system.web>

        <compilation debug="true"/>

        <authentication mode="Windows"/>

        <httpModules>

            <add name="GoogleAnalytics" type="Clarius.GoogleAnalyticsModule"/>

        </httpModules>

    </system.web>

</configuration>

 Enjoy!

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