[ic] Count

[interchange-users@icdevgroup.org (Kevin Walsh)]

> 
> Hi, I know it's a difficult task but I REALLY need a function that will: 
> 
> A) Show total # of users currently online
> B) Show "which" users are currently online
> 
> I'm using IC 4.8 and a SQL database.
> 
> ANY help at all would be really appreciated.
> 
It's not a difficult task, just expensive in terms of the processing
required to work it out.  This has been covered before, so a scan
of the list archives may turn up some useful code.  Basically, you
need to do the following:

   1. Decide how long a user may remain inactive before being
      considered "offline" for the purposes of your report.
      (Five minutes is probably ok for this).
   2. Scan through the session files/table/etc., looking for
      users that are "online", using the criteria in (1).
   3. For each session found, extract the logged-in username
      (if any).
   4. Produce some text that says "5 users online", followed by
      a list of usernames, followed by "2 anonymous users" (or
      whatever you want to display).

It's not difficult from a programming point of view, but I doubt that
you'd want to show that report on every page.  If your site is busy
then a [timed-build] may come in useful here, as long as you set the
timeout to a very low number; probably around half of the time you
decide for (1).

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