Analyze IIS HTTP logs with the HttpLogBrowser

Goal

In the IIS web server, the web requests activity can be stored in HTTP log files located by default in a folder like C:\inetpub\logs\LogFiles\W3SVC%
The HttpLogBrowser is a Windows desktop application with a free edition that can read and parse those logs to load them for viewing and analysis.

You can load either individual log files or the whole log folder of an IIS web site.
During the parsing process some web requests can be ignored and new fields can be extracted like the client browser or a tracking cookie.
Once loaded you can view the log rows in a data grid
And statistics are displayed for every field.

Main view of the HttpLogBrowser with log rows on the right and statistics on the left

In the statistics you can click on a value to automatically filter down the view and only display log rows matching this value.
Every time you click on a value the new filter is added to the existing filter.
Every filter is kept in the filter history so you can easily go back to a previous filter.
The filter expression is automatically built in SQL syntax. If needed you can build your own custom SQL filter expression.

Time statistics chart in the HttpLogBrowser displaying the web request frequency evolution

In the Time Statistics chart, you can see the evolution of the web requests frequency to locate peak activity.
You can then zoom in a specific period of time to only display log rows in this period and see more precisely what’s going on.
If you double click on a specific position in time in the chart, the nearest corresponding log row will be automatically highlighted in the data grid allowing you to see concerned web requests.
Counterwise if you change the selected log row in the data grid a red cursor will automatically move in the Time Statistics chart allowing you to visualize the position in time of the web request.

Web browser statistics pie chart in the HttpLogBrowser

Field statistics can be displayed in pie charts.
A double click on slices also allows you to filter down log rows.
For numeric fields the chart is an histogram.
For example the time taken field histogram allows you to see in how much time (ms) web request are proceed by your web server.

Statistics of the time taken by web page executions in the HTTP Log Browser