Event Logging

LANSA

Event Logging

Example 229 - Rating: specific

This example uses a LANSA for the Web feature called Event Logging. Event logging (sometimes called click tracking) selectively records the activity at a web site. It may help you to better understand how people visiting your site are using it so that you can improve its usability.

LANSA for the WEB provides two levels of event logging:

SUMMARY level records information about the site’s usage, functions accessed, dates and times, users.
DETAILED level extends the summary information and allows you to track up to 10 user defined fields.

This example demonstrates the recording of SUMMARY and DETAILED information. A simple web page is used as the vehicle for this example. It has these features:

A search field.
A link to a “special offers” page.
Links to the IBM and Microsoft sites.

This example demonstrates how the usage of each of these features may be better understood by using event logging:

The search field: because we want to better understand what people are most commonly searching for.
The link to a “special offers” page: because we want to know how many people visit the special offers page, and which special offer they actually look at when they get there.
The links to the IBM and Microsoft sites: because we want to know how many people click through our page to either the IBM or the Microsoft web sites.

Detailed Notes and Suggestions

When using the event logging facilities there are two main things that you need to consider:

The mechanics of using event logging
Analysis of the event logs.

Most of the content of this example focuses on the when, where and how of event logging. Some suggestions are made as to ways that you might approach the analysis.

The mechanics of using event logging

This diagram of shows the main components used to record event logging information in this example:

You must include the LANSA for Web tag <RDML TRACE> in the DEFAULT_LAYOUT page (or <process>_LAYOUT if the process uses one).

To log SUMMARY information: in your DEFAULT_TRACE page (or process specific <process name>_TRACE), add the LANSA for the Web tag TRACE_SUMMARY.
To log both SUMMARY and DETAILED information: in your DEFAULT_TRACE page (or your process specific <process name>_TRACE) add the LANSA for the Web tag TRACE_DETAILED.

Analysis of the event logs

The events are logged in two LANSA files:

SUMMARY information is logged in file DC@W26
DETAILED information is logged in file DC@W27

There many different ways to analyze the information. Here are some suggestions:

A simple function that populates a browselist.
A VL application where you can generate a graphic
Feed the data into a MS Excel spreadsheet
A LANSA/Client query

This Example Also Demonstrates:

How to redirect a LANSA for the Web page to another URL

Keywords

Example 229	RDML TRACE
CLICK TRACKING	EVENT LOGGING
TRACE DETAILED	TRACE SUMMARY
REDIRECT

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