Total Kynosarges page hits as determined by Google Analytics shrank once again year-over-year, going from 125,757 in 2016 (weblog 56,993, website 68,764) to 101,616 in 2017 (weblog 54,077, website 47,539). As you can see the major shrinkage came from the website while the weblog was fairly stable. Let’s see the annual Top Ten pages, starting with weblog posts. I’m listing the original publishing date, total number of non-unique views for each page, and rounded change in views from 2016.
- DPI Settings in Windows 10 (September 2015, 12,260 views, +2,000) This post sticking at the top is somewhat weird as all Windows 10 users should be on “Creators Update” by now, for which I have a separate but still far less popular article. Probably an artifact of search engine ranking.
- JavaFX DPI Scaling: Fixed! (June 2015, 4,251 3,976 views, +300) Small gain as adoption of Java SE 8 increases. This post has now overtaken the older (and obsolete) post on the same subject.
- DPI Settings in Windows 10 Creators Update (April 2017, 4,084 views) The most popular new entry, unsurprisingly so since Windows DPI issues have long been a hot topic here.
- JavaFX DPI Scaling (August 2013, 3,260 views, –1,200) Continued expected loss since these issues have been fixed for a while.
- JavaFX ListView Sizing (November 2013, 1,916 views, ±0) Stable views, unsurprising as the JavaFX layout system has not changed.
- JavaFX Spinner for Numbers (October 2016, 1,884 views, +1,100) New entry from 2016, published too late for that year’s Top Ten.
- JavaFX Chart Coloring (May 2017, 1,722 views) Another new entry covering another obscure JavaFX API.
- WebView, the other JavaFX UI (December 2013, 1,651 views, –1,700) Likely no longer in the Top Ten next year. I ultimately didn’t follow through on this idea, and it seems nobody else did either.
- JavaFX Pane Clipping (November 2016, 1,610 views, +800) Second new entry from late 2016, covering yet more JavaFX arcana.
- Simulating Platform.runAndWait (May 2014, 1,552 views, -6) This JavaFX evergreen snuck into the Top Ten once more.
Two 2017 posts and two late 2016 posts made their Top Ten debut this year. I suspect a few 2017 posts will likewise make their appearance next year. Once again, all but the two Windows DPI posts covered JavaFX issues which tend to gain traction quickly thanks to Jonathan Giles’ weekly links on FxExperience. And now on to my static website pages…
- Java for C# Programmers (August 2013, 11,286 views, –700) Small loss relative to its popularity. I’m keeping this article up-to-date for new Java versions. Last year I added a section on Java 9 modules.
- Rise of Nations on Windows 8 (February 2013, 6,693 views, –9,400) Huge but expected loss. There is little reason to not just buy the updated Steam version that was published in mid-2014.
- High DPI Settings in Windows (May 2011, 6,369 views, –4,100) Big loss, corresponding to widespread adoption of Windows 10 which is covered on the weblog.
- WPF Drawing Performance (June 2011, 3,867 views, –1,100) Losses in line with the declining popularity of this framework.
- DPI Scaling in Windows GUIs (May 2013, 3,509 views, –3,200) Massive loss, likely because DPI scaling is no longer an issue for JavaFX, or even Swing in Java SE 9, while .NET GUI development has fallen out of fashion.
- Check .NET Version with Inno Setup (September 2012, 3,695 views, –900) Moderate loss, again likely mirroring the general decline of .NET for desktop clients.
- Hexkit Strategy Game System (March 2000, 1,077 views, –600) Relatively big loss. I suppose the ancient age of this frozen project is finally showing.
- Tektosyne Library for Java (September 2010, 973 views, +400) The only gain in the entire list, thanks to the Java port completed in December 2016.
- .NET Struct Performance (June 2011, 948 views, –300) Expected loss for a frozen article with many caveats.
- LaTeX Typesetting with MiKTeX (June 2012, 643 views, ±0) Remarkably stable, much like the small but untiring community of LaTeX devotees!
Nearly all Top Ten articles lost page views in 2017, sometimes massively so. This is not terribly surprising: they generally cover specific technologies that have become or are becoming obsolete. Looking at the numbers and subjects, this year’s statistics could easily show a loss of another 20,000 views.
Random Fun Statistics
The first table shows all sources that contributed a total of at least one percent of all sessions (with one or more pageviews) in 2017. For the record, there were 38,747 sessions on the static site and 43,754 sessions on the blog, for a combined total of 82,501 sessions.
Google once again completely dominates. The only other notable search engine (Bing) lags by a factor of ten, barely even edging out my own cross-linking (“self”) from site to blog or vice versa. Other declared sources are minuscule, with FxExperience and Twitter driving some traffic to the blog and Stack Overflow to the static website. Interestingly, site readers seem much more eager to not leave any traces than blog readers!
| Source | Site | Blog | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| 49% | 69% | 60% | |
| (none) | 30% | 12% | 20% |
| Bing | 3.6% | 7.4% | 5.6% |
| (self) | 7.6% | 2.9% | 5.1% |
| FxExperience | ~0% | 2.7% | 1.5% |
| Stack Overflow | 2.1% | 0.3% | 1.2% |
| ~0% | 1.8% | 1% |
The next table breaks down sessions by visitor country IP, down to Brazil so I had all four BRIC countries covered. Interestingly, only those four and Poland are more interested in the static site than in the weblog. This trend is stable for other one-percent entries, as far as I checked: western visitors prefer blog posts, eastern and southern visitors prefer website articles. I suspect this is because many weblog entries have cultural topics, whereas the static site is purely technical in nature.
| Country | Site | Blog | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| USA | 23% | 26% | 24.7% |
| Germany | 6.6% | 8.8% | 7.7% |
| UK | 5.4% | 5.6% | 5.5% |
| India | 4.9% | 3.7% | 4.3% |
| Canada | 3.8% | 3.9% | 3.9% |
| Russia | 3.7% | 2.7% | 3.1% |
| France | 1.9% | 3.0% | 2.5% |
| China | 3.9% | 1.3% | 2.5% |
| Australia | 2.0% | 2.7% | 2.4% |
| Italy | 2.2% | 2.3% | 2.2% |
| Poland | 2.2% | 1.8% | 2.0% |
| Netherlands | 1.6% | 1.9% | 1.8% |
| Brazil | 1.8% | 1.7% | 1.7% |
The final table shows all combinations of visitor operating system and browser with at least one percent of sessions. Unlike the data for traffic sources, very few people bother to camouflage this information. Most visitors use Windows which is unsurprising for a programming site not specifically covering another OS. The nearly as large dominance of Google Chrome is concerning, given that the same company also dominates search hits. At least Microsoft Edge has finally passed Internet Explorer, which however remains shockingly popular. Finally, note that BRICs (see analysis above) are fond of Android and Windows with Chrome or Opera!
| OS & Browser | Site | Blog | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Windows Chrome | 52% | 47% | 49% |
| Windows Firefox | 12% | 13% | 12.6% |
| Windows Edge | 6.6% | 8.7% | 7.7% |
| Windows IE | 5.2% | 6.5% | 5.9% |
| Android Chrome | 6.2% | 3.9% | 5.0% |
| Macintosh Chrome | 3.6% | 4.9% | 4.3% |
| iOS Safari | 3.2% | 3.7% | 3.4% |
| Linux Chrome | 2.1% | 3.0% | 2.6% |
| Macintosh Safari | 1.6% | 2.8% | 2.2% |
| Linux Firefox | 1.0% | 2.6% | 1.8% |
| Windows Opera | 1.4% | 1.0% | 1.1% |
Webmaster News
Kynosarges had a fair number of cosmetic changes in 2017. You can read about them in the following posts if you’re interested in the technical details.
- Exif for WordPress Galleries, i.e. when not using Jetpack Carousel
- Simple Twitter Cards for Jetpack including the “featured image”
- Self-Hosted WordPress Galleries using FooBox and FooGallery
- WordPress Sitemaps with Jetpack, later removed as pointless
- New Theme: Twenty Sixteen, the most obvious change