Method for characterizing and visualizing patterns of usage of a web site by network users

A system is disclosed for displaying information pertaining to the usage of Web pages. The system comprises first and second Web sites (25,20). The first Web site (25) comprises plural Web-component files, each having a name in a Web-site directory. The second Web site (20) comprises plural statistics files, each containing usage information about a corresponding Web-component file or sub-directory of Web-component files. The system further comprises a computing device that has a display screen (30), is operable by a user, and is in communication with the first and second Web sites. The computing device is operated under the control of Web-browser software effective for displaying (35,42), on the screen, Web components of the respective Web sites. Significantly, the computing device is effective for requesting and retrieving, from either of the Web sites, data that correspond to user-designated Web components, and it is effective for directing a data request to either of the Web sites in response to user-designation of a Web component from the other Web site.