Re: Measurement Protocol not working for my account

[Roberto Hashioka]

Hi Jim, 

So, the cid has to be in the UUID format or it can be '555' for instance? 

Thanks in advance.

Roberto

On Thursday, January 30, 2014 4:22:18 PM UTC-8, Jim Wogulis wrote:

Great, glad to hear you got it working.

-- Jim

On Thu, Jan 30, 2014 at 3:25 PM, Data Dynamics <boundless.fund...@gmail.com> wrote:

The UUID thing fixed it.

On Thu, Jan 30, 2014 at 5:03 PM, Data Dynamics <boundless.fund...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Jim

Thanks again for the followup .... below is output from a test script, the one that worked earlier. This is an associative array (hash) in PHP which gets turned into an HTTP POST request body when sent.

After some more Googling (pun) I did find one thing ..... the MP Developer Guide implies that the unique client id is free form (examples say cid=555), whereas the parameter reference specififes it as a UUIDv4 128-bit value. I had missed this distinction previously, however as I said it worked fine without it once. I have switched my test tool to generate a UUID and I'm running it now against UA-47189115-1 

https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/protocol/v1/devguide#page

https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/protocol/v1/parameters#cid

IIUC I am using the "web" mode, and using pageviews with custom metrics to represent data sets that are not eCommerce related.

Thanks again

Dave

On Thu, Jan 30, 2014 at 4:03 PM, Jim Wogulis <jwog...@google.com> wrote:

Thanks for your feedback, I will pass on your suggestions to product management.

The three tracking IDs you provided are all enabled for Universal Analytics and hence support the measurement protocol. They are also configured to be "Web" instead of "App" profiles. Note that if you send &t=appview hits to a web profile they will not appear in reports.

If you send me some sample tracking protocol requests I can try to help debug the issue.

-- Jim

On Thu, Jan 30, 2014 at 12:28 PM, Data Dynamics <boundless.fund...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Jim

That's the joke .... there is no website, no browser, and no JavaScript. We are all trying to use a new GA feature called Measurement Protocol, but the whole GA product is still very much browser and JavaScript centric. For example, the ONLY way to get any kind of debugging feedback is to show the JavaScript plugin to Google's server, which obviously doesn't help if you're using MP :)

If you're curious, my client library is PHP-cURL but I have tried others and it's clearly not the issue. 

It worked once on UA-47189115-1 but is no longer working with the same script, my other two are UA-47528937-2 and UA-47528937-1 and these have never worked. 

One thing the documentation says nothing about is what is needed in terms of a fake website, if anything, to make MP work. The Property Settings display still has a thing called Default URL and I was wondering what I need to do with this. When I set up UA-47189115-1 it asked me to do the Site Verification thing from Website Tools, so I did - I may have been just clicking around to get to that page. I also tried proactively verifying a hostname for the others. 

Would you pass the following feedback on to the product manager for GA? This is easy stuff a couple of interns could knock out in a few weeks, but it would add tremendously to the 

1. There needs to be a way to test and debug MP clients, and indeed clients for GA in general. I recommend the following:

a. when there is a bad request, return a meaningful HTTP status code and error message instead of a 200 and the one pixel image

b. provide some kind of test mode where there is a button which will do the overnight data crunching on demand, for very small data sets

c. provide a way to delete test data, e.g. everything before a certain date

2. Provide more data types in Custom Metrics, most painful for me is the lack of a percent, or failing that a floating point number - I'd add both.

3. Make the graph part of a report honour the filter, not just the tabular data

4. Provide basic arithmetic functions on individual data points on the fly, e.g. if I have a graph of Texas sales vs. USA sales, let me divide one by the other, data point by data point, and plot a graph that shows what percentage of sales came from Texas.

5. Allow (with restrictions) one time bulk imports of historical data, either using the MP API or batch files. This isn't relevant to web traffic, but is for using it as a general analytics tool. 

6. Provide moe pricing tiers, notably a paid version with tech support that's affordable at the SMB level. We would buy this in a heartbeat, but we can't afford $150,000.00 :)

Cheers

Dave

On Thu, Jan 30, 2014 at 12:35 PM, Jim Wogulis <jwog...@google.com> wrote:

You can also look at the tracking code setup for the property to see which JavaScript snippet it shows: analytics.js means it is UA.

The tracking protocol endpoint (http://www.google-analytics.com/collect) only does collection and not validation. We want to ensure your data is collected even if your configuration may have filtered it out. This allows for the potential to reprocess data at a later time.

We are aware of the difficulty of debugging this and have some efforts underway to improve the situation. In the meantime you can sometimes use RealTime analytics for more immediate feedback.

If you send me your property ID (UA-XXXXXX-YY) and some sample tracking procotol requests I can take a look.

-- Jim

On Thu, Jan 30, 2014 at 9:20 AM, <boundless.fund...@gmail.com> wrote:

Jim - is there a way to tell if the account is already on UA? I set up a new one the other day which I believe I set to UA on creation. The setting you refer to for upgrading to UA does not show up in the Property settings tab, can I infer by omission that I'm on UA?

I share Andrea's frustration with the lack of debug capability, it's like the 1960's and overnight punched card runs, but in the 1960's you at least got back a meaningful error from the compiler instead of silence. Google's effort at debug help is "give us a URL and show us your JavaScript", clearly whoever wrote that doesn't know MP exists.

I have a test script I wrote 2-3 weeks ago which worked fine against a test setup in GA, I tried it again yesterday and got nada.

On Monday, December 30, 2013 6:26:40 PM UTC-6, Jim Wogulis wrote:

The upgrade is general available except for properties that have Display Advertiser Features enabled.

-- Jim

On Mon, Dec 30, 2013 at 2:30 PM, Andrea Cimino <andrea...@gmail.com> wrote:

Dear Jim,

I followed your instructions, in particular:

1. Sign in to Google Analytics. From the Admin page, select the account and property you want to upgrade.
2. In the property column, click Universal Analytics Upgrade.
3. In the section called Transfer to Universal Analytics, click Upgrade.

Unfortunately I can't see any section named Transfer to Universal Analytics

Please notice also that I have read/write access for that account.

I don't know if this feature is rolling out for all the accounts, or should be already available to everyone.

Thanks,

Andrea

 

2013/12/30 Andrea Cimino <andrea...@gmail.com>

Thanks Jim for the fast answer!

Unfortunately is very hard to understand what is going on since the 200 response status code is always returned.

I'll follow your instructions!

Kind regards,

Andrea

2013/12/30 Jim Wogulis <jwog...@google.com>

Your property (UA-38546923-1) has not been enabled/upgraded for Universal Analytics and therefore measurement protocol hits won't be processed. https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/upgrade/

-- Jim

On Mon, Dec 30, 2013 at 4:57 AM, Andrea Cimino <andrea...@gmail.com> wrote:

Dear all,

I have working account of Google Analytics, working properly in the site.

I would to track some events via the Measurement Protocol, but unfortunately is not working.

We tried many different url, a valid one should be this:

http://www.google-analytics.com/collect?v=1&tid=UA-38546923-1&cid=123&t=event&ec=home%20movement&ea=door%20open&el=bedroom

But this is not showing in live events and in the event report.

Does anyone of you is observing the same problem?

Regards,

Andrea

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[Andrea Cimino]

[Jim Wogulis]

Your property (UA-38546923-1) has not been enabled/upgraded for Universal Analytics and therefore measurement protocol hits won't be processed. https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/upgrade/

-- Jim

On Mon, Dec 30, 2013 at 4:57 AM, Andrea Cimino <andrea...@gmail.com> wrote:

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[Andrea Cimino]

Thanks Jim for the fast answer!

Unfortunately is very hard to understand what is going on since the 200 response status code is always returned.

I'll follow your instructions!

Kind regards,

Andrea

2013/12/30 Jim Wogulis <jwog...@google.com>

Your property (UA-38546923-1) has not been enabled/upgraded for Universal Analytics and therefore measurement protocol hits won't be processed. https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/upgrade/

-- Jim

[Andrea Cimino]

Dear Jim,

I followed your instructions, in particular:

1. Sign in to Google Analytics. From the Admin page, select the account and property you want to upgrade.
2. In the property column, click Universal Analytics Upgrade.
3. In the section called Transfer to Universal Analytics, click Upgrade.

Unfortunately I can't see any section named Transfer to Universal Analytics

Please notice also that I have read/write access for that account.

I don't know if this feature is rolling out for all the accounts, or should be already available to everyone.

Thanks,

Andrea

 

2013/12/30 Andrea Cimino <andrea...@gmail.com>

Thanks Jim for the fast answer!

[Jim Wogulis]

The upgrade is general available except for properties that have Display Advertiser Features enabled.

-- Jim

[boundless.fund...@gmail.com]

Jim - is there a way to tell if the account is already on UA? I set up a new one the other day which I believe I set to UA on creation. The setting you refer to for upgrading to UA does not show up in the Property settings tab, can I infer by omission that I'm on UA?

I share Andrea's frustration with the lack of debug capability, it's like the 1960's and overnight punched card runs, but in the 1960's you at least got back a meaningful error from the compiler instead of silence. Google's effort at debug help is "give us a URL and show us your JavaScript", clearly whoever wrote that doesn't know MP exists.

I have a test script I wrote 2-3 weeks ago which worked fine against a test setup in GA, I tried it again yesterday and got nada.

On Monday, December 30, 2013 6:26:40 PM UTC-6, Jim Wogulis wrote:

2013/12/30 Andrea Cimino <andrea...@gmail.com>

2013/12/30 Jim Wogulis <jwog...@google.com>

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to google-analytics-measurement-protocol+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.

[Jim Wogulis]

You can also look at the tracking code setup for the property to see which JavaScript snippet it shows: analytics.js means it is UA.

The tracking protocol endpoint (http://www.google-analytics.com/collect) only does collection and not validation. We want to ensure your data is collected even if your configuration may have filtered it out. This allows for the potential to reprocess data at a later time.

We are aware of the difficulty of debugging this and have some efforts underway to improve the situation. In the meantime you can sometimes use RealTime analytics for more immediate feedback.

If you send me your property ID (UA-XXXXXX-YY) and some sample tracking procotol requests I can take a look.

-- Jim

On Thu, Jan 30, 2014 at 9:20 AM, <boundless.fund...@gmail.com> wrote:

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to google-analytics-measure...@googlegroups.com.

[Data Dynamics]

Hi Jim

That's the joke .... there is no website, no browser, and no JavaScript. We are all trying to use a new GA feature called Measurement Protocol, but the whole GA product is still very much browser and JavaScript centric. For example, the ONLY way to get any kind of debugging feedback is to show the JavaScript plugin to Google's server, which obviously doesn't help if you're using MP :)

If you're curious, my client library is PHP-cURL but I have tried others and it's clearly not the issue. 

It worked once on UA-47189115-1 but is no longer working with the same script, my other two are UA-47528937-2 and UA-47528937-1 and these have never worked. 

One thing the documentation says nothing about is what is needed in terms of a fake website, if anything, to make MP work. The Property Settings display still has a thing called Default URL and I was wondering what I need to do with this. When I set up UA-47189115-1 it asked me to do the Site Verification thing from Website Tools, so I did - I may have been just clicking around to get to that page. I also tried proactively verifying a hostname for the others. 

Would you pass the following feedback on to the product manager for GA? This is easy stuff a couple of interns could knock out in a few weeks, but it would add tremendously to the 

1. There needs to be a way to test and debug MP clients, and indeed clients for GA in general. I recommend the following:

a. when there is a bad request, return a meaningful HTTP status code and error message instead of a 200 and the one pixel image

b. provide some kind of test mode where there is a button which will do the overnight data crunching on demand, for very small data sets

c. provide a way to delete test data, e.g. everything before a certain date

2. Provide more data types in Custom Metrics, most painful for me is the lack of a percent, or failing that a floating point number - I'd add both.

3. Make the graph part of a report honour the filter, not just the tabular data

4. Provide basic arithmetic functions on individual data points on the fly, e.g. if I have a graph of Texas sales vs. USA sales, let me divide one by the other, data point by data point, and plot a graph that shows what percentage of sales came from Texas.

5. Allow (with restrictions) one time bulk imports of historical data, either using the MP API or batch files. This isn't relevant to web traffic, but is for using it as a general analytics tool. 

6. Provide moe pricing tiers, notably a paid version with tech support that's affordable at the SMB level. We would buy this in a heartbeat, but we can't afford $150,000.00 :)

Cheers

Dave

On Thu, Jan 30, 2014 at 12:35 PM, Jim Wogulis <jwog...@google.com> wrote:

[Jim Wogulis]

Thanks for your feedback, I will pass on your suggestions to product management.

The three tracking IDs you provided are all enabled for Universal Analytics and hence support the measurement protocol. They are also configured to be "Web" instead of "App" profiles. Note that if you send &t=appview hits to a web profile they will not appear in reports.

If you send me some sample tracking protocol requests I can try to help debug the issue.

-- Jim

On Thu, Jan 30, 2014 at 12:28 PM, Data Dynamics <boundless.fund...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Data Dynamics]

Hi Jim

Thanks again for the followup .... below is output from a test script, the one that worked earlier. This is an associative array (hash) in PHP which gets turned into an HTTP POST request body when sent.

After some more Googling (pun) I did find one thing ..... the MP Developer Guide implies that the unique client id is free form (examples say cid=555), whereas the parameter reference specififes it as a UUIDv4 128-bit value. I had missed this distinction previously, however as I said it worked fine without it once. I have switched my test tool to generate a UUID and I'm running it now against UA-47189115-1 

https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/protocol/v1/devguide#page

https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/protocol/v1/parameters#cid

IIUC I am using the "web" mode, and using pageviews with custom metrics to represent data sets that are not eCommerce related.

Thanks again

Dave

[Data Dynamics]

The UUID thing fixed it.

[Jim Wogulis]

Great, glad to hear you got it working.

-- Jim

[Igor Kovacevic]

I'm having the same problem of not seeing hits in GA (not even in Real time view).
I'm using Postman from Chrome to send requests and this is the request I'm trying to fire:
http://www.google-analytics.com/collect?v=1&tid=UA-48XXXXX-1&cid=550e8400-e29b-41d4-a716-446655440000&t=pageview

My GA tid is UA-48141584-1

Thanks

[Daniel Richards]

I would recommend using a UUID, and ignoring the '555' in the examples. 

I work on a project where a previous developer had specified '555', and what we witnessed were a few hits coming through, and after that nothing. I imagine Google block multiple hits from the same client id as potentially malicious content. Specifying an anonymous unique UUID per device/user combination as the client id resolved the issue.

[Andrew Seward]

I was having a similar issue, and was able to get it working by supplying the Application Name parameter ("an"). It is listed as optional on the parameter reference page, but I haven't gotten anything to work without it.

Maybe this will help with your issue.

[Guille Santa Fe]

I think I found the problem! Using the url to debug the measurement protocol (google-analytics.com/debug/collect) saw that the server was responding with an error. Checking the url I realized that the example of debugging was using https instead of http. I add the "s" to http and the debugger says that the hit is invalid!

I have to wait a few days to verify it but after trying a lot of things in the last month, I'm pretty sure the problem is solved!

regards

Guillermo

[Leo Chen]

Hi Guillermo,

Did you get it to work? I'm having trouble seeing the update on my GA reporting page.