Posts Tagged SWFMontreal
The post of the year
It is that time of the year where I look back and ponder. As I had foreseen, 2009 was really a great year (at least professionally but that’s another story). If my skills improved a lot in 2008 they continued to do so in 2009. I got to play a great deal with Papervision3D (roar4milk, Holiday Humanoes) and I got to modify my project workflow a lot too (I plan to make a presentation on that this year).
In numbers, I got to write 62 posts ( a bit less than once a week) and got 478 comments since September 2008. As for traffic, I am now getting 25 000 visitors a month, this is 10k less than the goal I set myself a year ago, but I don’t think it is so bad; my traffic is still growing steadily month after month. I did not write another article for InsideRIA like I wanted to, but I wrote 2 that got printed in FFDMag ( one of those I intended for InsideRIA but someone wrote on Google Analytics for Flash before me). What I am really proud of is that I got to give 2 presentations; one online and one in person at the Montreal Flash User Group. This is something I want to do more in 2010, 3 or 4 speaking engagements would be really nice. I already got an article nearly done so if I could get 1 or 2 more I would be happy. Lastly, I my traffic could increase to 35k visitors a month I think that would be enough for me. While we are at this, if I could be part of writing a book on ActionScript, that would just be the craziest.
Anyway, what I wish for the coming year is that I keep doing what I am doing. If I keep up the good work, good things will come my way, as simple as that, it worked fine in the past and I am pretty sure it will stay that way, naïvely. Blogging is all about keeping doing it.
May 2010 be as good for all of us as 2009 was good for me. Happy new year!
Why I have been talking so much about Google Analytics lately
Posted by zedia.net in Google Analytics on June 18th, 2009
If you take a look at my 4-5 last post you’ll notice that they are all about Google Analytics, be it Google Analytics for Flash or Google Analytics Data API. There are a couple of good reasons for that.
A new presentation
First, I’m really proud (and scared) to say that I am going to give a presentation at the InsideRIA conference in August in San Jose. The topic will be Google Analytics For Flash so I’m mostly going to reuse my presentation I did for the Montreal Flash User Group but I will adapt it for RIAs and I will add a big part on how to retrieve the data you send to Google back in your RIA using Google Analytics Data API. So I need to shape up on those topics and learn every thing there is to learn so that I can give a presentation with great content.
A new application
Secondly, I have this great idea. I wasn’t going to blog about it at first until it was done but my motivation kinda withered so I hope that by exposing it here and getting feedback I will start working on it again. What I want to do is build a rich internet application that displays Google Analytics Data in a way that makes more sense for Flash website. Flash website differs from HTML website in a lot of ways but web analytics don’t display their data while taking these differences into consideration. If we only take preloading and videos, we could have insightful data visualization that would show how many people saw which section of your video (that could be a heat map representing the timeline of the video) or how many people started the preloading process but didn’t end it. Another area that I would like to tackle is to set a standard on how to use events.
Right now there is no clear guideline on how to use events. It’s really free for all and no one is doing the same thing, so when you go in someone else reports it takes a while to understand what is going on. So I would basically be creating a set of guidelines for Events and then my application would be interpreting them differently than Google Analytics. While I’m there I could also associate events with pageviews. What is disturbing right now is that with events you can know how many people clicked on your button but it is pretty hard to see how many people actually saw the button so it’s hard to tell if your interface is performing well.
Well that my plan, the first step was to be able to connect to Google Analytics Data API using Flash on a webserver which I found out how. Now what I have left to do is create the guidelines for events and the interpret the data from Google Analytics. If you got any feedback on my idea please put it in the comments; it would really motivate me to start working on it.
My Google Analytics For Flash presentation slides
Posted by zedia.net in Google Analytics on June 2nd, 2009
Last Thursday I did my presentation on Google Analytics for Flash for SWFMontreal and it went really well. I learned 2 things while doing it. First that I should practice presenting out loud before doing my real presentation because it just better than practicing in my head. Secondly that a bomb threat in the Montreal metro can really decimate the audience. As a matter of fact, since there was the previously mentioned threat, the attendance to the user group was greatly reduced (15 people instead of 50). That was sad, but there was nothing I could do. I still wanted to post my slides so here they are.
On the same note, I received my copy of the Flash & Flex developer’s magazine where my article on Google Analytics For Flash was published and it feels very nice to see my own work in paper. They forgot to put my bio where I mention this blog, but I think they will fix this on my next article on TubeLoc. Can’t wait to see it.
Here is the verbatim from my slides
Google Analytics For Flash – Presentation Transcript
1. Google Analytics for Flash
2. Dominic Gélineau Flash developer Analytics, Animation, SEO dgelineau@gmail.com Blog: www.zedia.net Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/zedia WE ARE HIRING aubrey@twistimage.com
3. Why care about analytics? Because it’s cool To provide data to your clients on the impact of what you are doing To give you feedback on the effectivness of your work
4. Why Google Analytics? It’s free It’s widely used It has a concept called event It now has a library just for Flash
5. Basic concepts about web analytics PageViews Events
6. PageViews The PageViews model is based on the HTML version of a web page The real idea behind a pageView is NAVIGATION In HTML this is sent automaticaly every time the user changes or refresh the pageIn Flash we have to do this manually We should try and keep the same syntax as HTML for consistency
7. Events The real idea behind events is INTERACTION Whenever you want to track something that is not related to navigation you should use an event. In Google Analytics Events are not enabled for all profiles http://code.google.com/p/gaforflash/wiki/EventTrackingRequ est
8. Google Analytics for Flash Library http://code.google.com/p/gaforflash/ Just search Google for «Google Analytics for Flash»
9. How to install it Flex and Flash CS4 can import SWC Flash CS3 can’t Download the library from SVN Put the SWC file in this folder: C:\\Program Files\\Adobe\\Adobe Flash CS3\\language\\Configuration\\Components Macintosh HD:Applications:Adobe Flash CS3:Configuration:Components
10. Sample Code import com.google.analytics.AnalyticsTracker; import com.google.analytics.GATracker; var _tracker:AnalyticsTracker = new GATracker ( main, “UA-7777777-7”, “AS3”); _tracker.trackPageview(yourSectionName + “/”);
11. More on Events _tracker.trackEvent(“English”, “Client Quiz”, “Question 3”, value); Category, Action, Label, valueOnly the two first are mandatory Value is an integer No standards, no real guidelines
12. 2 Modes: AS3 vs Bridge The library can work in two modes, AS3 or Bridge. Each of them has there advantages.
13. AS3 Mode Stand Alone mode Doesn’t require javascript Usefull for full Flash website Usefull when you don’t control the HTML that wraps the swf like for widgets or games
14. Bridge Mode var _tracker:AnalyticsTracker = new GATracker (main, “window.PageTracker”, “Bridge”); Integrates better when the Flash part of a website is minor Enables more of the Google Analytics API like E-commerce allowScriptAccess = always
15. Visual Debug var _tracker:AnalyticsTracker = new GATracker (main, “UA-7777777-7”, “AS3”, true); One of the coolest features of GA for Flash Permits you to see in real time what is being sent to Google Clear advantage over the old way, which was to wait 3 hours and check to see if everything worked
16. Visual Debug Screenshot
17. What should you track Too much is like not enough Tracking errors is really helpful
18. One draw back The library will add 40k to your project Might not be the best thing for all project Like banners
19. Links Google Code – http://code.google.com/p/gaforflash/ Developer group – http://groups.google.com/group/ga-for- flash?pli= 1 Adobe Max presentation on GA for Flash – http://tv.adobe.com/#vi+f15385v1040
20. Questions?
21. Thank you Dominic Gélineau dgelineau@gmail.com www.zedia.net http://www.twitter.com/zedia
