Trackable

Trackable is a simple analytics integration helper library. It’s especially designed for easy and comfortable integration with existing projects.

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Main features:

• [x] Easy integration to existing classes using extensions and protocols
• [x] Programmatically generated event and property identifiers
• [x] Smart tracking of properties by objects chaining (if object “A” is set to be a parent of object “B”, event tracked on object “B” will also contain tracked properties from “A”)

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Instalation

CocoaPods

CocoaPods is a dependency manager for Cocoa projects. You can install it with the following command:

$ gem install cocoapods

To integrate Trackable into your Xcode project using CocoaPods, specify it in your Podfile:

source 'https://github.com/CocoaPods/Specs.git'
platform :ios, '9.0'
use_frameworks!

pod 'Trackable'

Then, run the following command:

$ pod install

Carthage

Carthage is a decentralized dependency manager that builds your dependencies and provides you with binary frameworks.

You can install Carthage with Homebrew using the following command:

$ brew update
$ brew install carthage

To integrate trackable into your Xcode project using Carthage, specify it in your Cartfile:

github "VojtaStavik/Trackable"

Run carthage update to build the framework and drag the built Trackable.framework into your Xcode project.

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Usage

Integration of the Trackable library is very easy and straightforward. See example app with complete implementation including all features.

Events and Keys

Define events and keys using enums with String raw representation. These enums have to conform to Event or Key protocols. You can use nesting for better organization. String identifiers are created automatically, and they respect the complete enums structure. Example: Events.App.started will be translated to “<ModuleName>.Events.App.started” string.

enum Events {
    enum User : String, Event {
        case didSelectBeatle
        case didSelectAlbum
        case didRateAlbum
    }

    enum App : String, Event {
        case started
        case didBecomeActive
        case didEnterBackground
        case terminated
    }

    enum AlbumListVC : String, Event {
        case didAppear
    }
}

enum Keys : String, Key {
    case beatleName
    case albumName
    case userLikesAlbum
    case previousVC

    enum App : String, Key {
        case uptime
        case reachabilityStatus
    }
}

Tracking

You can track events on any class conforming to the TrackableClass protocol by calling self.track(event: Event). You can also call self.track(event: Event, trackedProperties: Set<TrackedProperty>) if you want to add some specific properties to the tracked event.

TrackedProperty is a struct you can create using a custom infix operator ~>> with Key and value. Allowed value types are String, Double, Int, Bool and Set<TrackedProperty>.

// Example:

import UIKit
import Trackable

class AlbumDetailVC: UIViewController {

    var album : Album!

    @IBOutlet weak var yesButton: UIButton!
    @IBOutlet weak var noButton: UIButton!

    @IBAction func didPressButton(sender: UIButton) {
        let userLikesAlbum = (sender === yesButton)
        track(Events.User.didRateAlbum, trackedProperties: [Keys.userLikesAlbum ~>> userLikesAlbum])
    }
}

extension AlbumDetailVC : TrackableClass { }

Tracked properties

Trackable is designed to allow you to easily track all properties you need. There are three levels where you can add custom data to tracked events. If you add a property with the same name, it will override the previous value with a lower level.

Level 3

• when calling track()function
• properties on this level will be added only to the currently tracked event
• Typical usage: When you want to track properties closely connected to the event.

// Example:
track(Events.User.didRateAlbum, trackedProperties: [Keys.userLikesAlbum ~>> userLikesAlbum])

Level 2

• instance properties added by calling setupTrackableChain(trackedProperties:) on a TrackableClass instance.
• these properties will be added to all events tracked on the object
• Typical usage: When you want to set properties from the outside of the object (the object doesn’t know about them)

// Example:
import UIKit
import Trackable

class AlbumListTVC: UITableViewController {
	… code …

    // MARK: - Navigation
    override func prepareForSegue(segue: UIStoryboardSegue, sender: AnyObject?) {
        let destinationVC = segue.destinationViewController as! AlbumDetailVC
        destinationVC.setupTrackableChain([Keys.previousVC ~>> "Album list"]) // all events tracked on destinationVC will have previousVC property included automatically
    }
}

extension AlbumListTVC : TrackableClass { }

Level 1

• computed properties added by custom implementation of the TrackableClass protocol
• these properties will be added to all events tracked on the object
• Typical usage: When you want to add some set of properties to all events tracked on the object.

// Example:
class AlbumListTVC: UITableViewController {
    var albums : [Album]!

    override func tableView(tableView: UITableView, didSelectRowAtIndexPath indexPath: NSIndexPath) {
        track(Events.User.didSelectAlbum) // selectedAlbum property will be added automatically
    }

    var selectedAlbum : Album? {
        if let indexPath = tableView.indexPathForSelectedRow {
            return albums[indexPath.row]
        } else {
            return nil
        }
    }
}

extension AlbumListTVC : TrackableClass {
    var trackedProperties : Set<TrackedProperty> {
        return [Keys.albumName ~>> selectedAlbum?.name ?? "none"]
    }
}

Chaining

The real advantage of Trackable comes with chaining. You can set one object to be a Trackable parent of another object. If class A is a parent of class B, all events tracked on B will also automatically include trackedProperties from A.

// Example:
import UIKit
import Trackable

class AlbumListTVC: UITableViewController {

	… some code here …

    // MARK: - Navigation
    override func prepareForSegue(segue: UIStoryboardSegue, sender: AnyObject?) {
        let destinationVC = segue.destinationViewController as! AlbumDetailVC
        destinationVC.setupTrackableChain([Keys.previousVC ~>> "Album list"], parent: self)
    }

    var selectedAlbum : Album? {
        if let indexPath = tableView.indexPathForSelectedRow {
            return albums[indexPath.row]
        } else {
            return nil
        }
    }
}

extension AlbumListTVC : TrackableClass {
    var trackedProperties : Set<TrackedProperty> {
        return [Keys.albumName ~>> selectedAlbum?.name ?? "none"]
    }
}

// All events tracked later on destinationVC will automatically have previousVC and albumName properties,
// without destinationVC even knowing those values exist!

Connecting to Mixpanel (or any other service)

In order to perform the actual tracking into an analytics service, you have to provide an implementation for Trackable.trackEventToRemoteServiceClosure.

// Example:
import Foundation
import Mixpanel
import Trackable

let analytics = Analytics() // singleton (yay!)

class Analytics {
    let mixpanel = Mixpanel.sharedInstanceWithToken("<token>")

    init() {
        Trackable.trackEventToRemoteServiceClosure = trackEventToMixpanel
        setupTrackableChain() // allows self to be part of the trackable chain
    }

    func trackEventToMixpanel(eventName: String, trackedProperties: [String: AnyObject]) {        
        mixpanel.track(eventName, properties: trackedProperties)
    }
}

extension Analytics : TrackableClass { }

Maybe you want to add some properties to all events tracked in your app. It’s similar to Mixpanel super properties but with dynamic content! You need to provide a custom implementation of the TrackableClass protocol:

extension Analytics : TrackableClass {
    var trackedProperties : Set<TrackedProperty> {
        return [Keys.App.uptime ~>> NSDate().timeIntervalSinceDate(startTime)]
    }
}

and set the analytics object as a parent to all objects without a parent by calling setupTrackableChain(parent: analytics) on them:

// Example:
import UIKit
import Trackable

@UIApplicationMain
class AppDelegate: UIResponder, UIApplicationDelegate {
    var window: UIWindow?

    func application(application: UIApplication, didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions: [NSObject : AnyObject]?) -> Bool {
        setupTrackableChain(parent: analytics)
        return true
    }

    func applicationDidBecomeActive(application: UIApplication) {
        track(Events.App.didBecomeActive)
    }

    func applicationDidEnterBackground(application: UIApplication) {
        track(Events.App.didEnterBackground)
    }

    func applicationWillTerminate(application: UIApplication) {
        track(Events.App.terminated)
    }

}

extension AppDelegate : TrackableClass { }

License

Trackable is released under the MIT license. See LICENSE for details.

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Readme inspired by Alamofire. Thank you!