When working with Apache Tomcat server logs, many developers need a straightforward way to extract basic usage statistics without complex setup or real-time monitoring. The key requirements typically include:

• Counting unique visitors by day/week/month
• Basic traffic pattern analysis
• Simple installation and operation
• No enterprise-level features

Here are three effective tools that meet these needs:

1. GoAccess

This real-time web log analyzer works beautifully with Tomcat logs:

# Install on Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt-get install goaccess

# Analyze Tomcat access log
goaccess /var/log/tomcat9/localhost_access_log.*.txt \
--log-format=COMBINED \
--output=report.html

2. AWStats

The classic log analyzer with solid Tomcat support:

# Sample AWStats configuration for Tomcat
LogFile="/var/log/tomcat/access_log.%YYYY-24%MM-24%DD-24.log"
LogFormat=4
SiteDomain="yourdomain.com"
HostAliases="localhost 127.0.0.1"

3. Analog

A lightweight alternative that's been around for decades:

# Sample analog configuration
LOGFILE /var/log/tomcat/localhost_access_log*.txt
HOSTNAME "My Tomcat Server"
OUTFILE ./tomcat_stats.html

For developers who prefer custom solutions, here's a simple Python script to count unique IPs:

import re
from collections import defaultdict

def analyze_tomcat_log(log_path):
    daily_counts = defaultdict(set)
    
    with open(log_path) as f:
        for line in f:
            # Extract IP and date from common Tomcat log format
            match = re.match(r'^(\d+\.\d+\.\d+\.\d+).*?\[(\d+/\w+/\d+)', line)
            if match:
                ip, date = match.groups()
                daily_counts[date].add(ip)
    
    for date, ips in sorted(daily_counts.items()):
        print(f"{date}: {len(ips)} unique visitors")

analyze_tomcat_log('/path/to/access_log.txt')

Consider these factors when selecting a solution:

When working with Apache Tomcat servers, analyzing access logs is crucial for understanding user behavior and server performance. While there are many commercial solutions available, open-source tools can provide excellent functionality for basic usage statistics extraction.

Here are three practical options that handle Tomcat's standard access log format well:

• GoAccess: Real-time terminal-based analyzer with HTML report generation
• AWStats: Classic web analytics solution with detailed reporting
• Log Parser Lizard: GUI tool for Windows with SQL-like query capabilities

For a command-line solution that's both powerful and simple to use, GoAccess stands out. Install it via package manager:

# Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt-get install goaccess

# CentOS/RHEL
sudo yum install goaccess

Basic usage to analyze Tomcat logs:

goaccess /path/to/tomcat/logs/localhost_access_log.* \
--log-format=COMBINED \
--output=report.html

Tomcat's access logs typically follow the COMBINED format (like Apache), but if you've customized the pattern in server.xml, you may need to adjust:

# For custom patterns
goaccess access_log --log-format='%h %l %u %t \"%r\" %s %b \"%{Referer}i\" \"%{User-Agent}i\"' \
--date-format=%d/%b/%Y \
--time-format=%T

For those preferring a web interface, AWStats can be configured for Tomcat:

# In awstats.yourdomain.conf
LogFile="/path/to/tomcat/logs/localhost_access_log.%YYYY-24%MM-24%DD-24"
LogFormat=1
SiteDomain="yourdomain.com"

Run the analysis:

perl awstats.pl -config=yourdomain -update

For quick command-line analysis without installing tools, you can use basic Unix commands:

# Unique IPs per day
cat localhost_access_log.* | awk '{print $4}' | cut -d: -f1 | uniq -c

# Requests by response code
cat localhost_access_log.* | awk '{print $9}' | sort | uniq -c | sort -rn

These methods give you immediate insights while keeping your toolchain lightweight.