Understanding BioCyc Usage Counts

BioCyc usage counts tally the number of BioCyc.org web page views made by an organization in a given time period. By basing the BioCyc subscription fee for a given year on your level of usage from the previous year, we strive to make your fee commensurate with the value you have derived from BioCyc. The usage counts consider BioCyc page views only, they do not count page views at other websites such as Google.

Our usage counts primarily include html pages and do not count other files that the browser downloads, such as javascript files, css files, ajax requests, or files containing images. We also only count pages that have URLs that contain the identifier of one of our organism databases, so pages for login, documentation, and similar non-organism pages are not counted in the paid usage counts.

Counts for free databases such as EcoCyc are not considered in quotes for renewals. Usage of API functions is counted, with each API call weighted at 30% of a browser page count in our calculation.

A number of BioCyc pages are highly interactive, but only the entry to the page is counted, and not subsequent clicks. For example, we count entry to the genome browser as one click, but we do not count subsequent searches, zooming and panning operations, display of pop-up windows, filter operations, or retrieval of sequence data. The zoomable metabolic map diagram (cellular overview) and omics dashboard are treated similarly.

Examples of pages that are counted (except for free databases such as EcoCyc):

• Gene, pathway, compound, and reaction pages
• All Search menu commands
• Cellular and Regulatory overviews
• Entry to genome browser
• Circular Genome Viewer
• Genome Poster
• Comparative analysis
• Get sequence
• Multiple sequence alignment (counts as 1, regardless of number of organisms requested)
• Omics and Genome Dashboards (entry page only – does not count drill-downs)
• Flux Balance Analysis
• Dead-end analysis (submission form and results page are counted separately)
• Special SmartTables of an organism

Examples of pages and operations that are not counted:

• User’s Guide
• Subscription Information Pages
• Webinars

Examples of actions in a page that don’t cause additional activity counts:

• Scrolling and zooming and searching in overview pages (such as cellular overview, regulatory overview, and genome browser)
• Changing tabs within a gene, pathway, compound or reaction page
• Any flux balance analysis pages after the request page
• Most operations within dashboards (e.g., hiding panels, generating pathway diagram pop-ups)
• Most operations within a SmartTable