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As a developer, you want to know how users interact with your mobile application. Whether you're building a consumer-focused app or a business-critical solution, understanding user behavior is crucial for improving the overall experience and driving growth. In this article, we'll explore the world of swift app development and discuss how to collect usage statistics in your PhoneGap/Cordova application.
When developing a couple of mobile applications, our team encountered a need to track user engagement and gather insights on what features were being used most frequently. We wanted a simple, yet effective solution that could provide us with basic statistics and potential for further analysis. Our research led us to Flurry, a popular analytics vendor that offers seamless integration with both iOS and Android platforms.
Flurry's zero-cost solution provides valuable insights into user behavior, including new users, retained users, device versions, and more. However, as with any free service, there's an agreement in place – you grant Flurry the right to collect, retain, use, and publish your data in an aggregate manner. This is a standard practice among many analytics vendors.
To integrate Flurry with PhoneGap/Cordova, we leveraged Plugman to easily install and configure the plugin. With some quick updates to the plugin to work with Cordova 2.9 and the latest IOS7 compatible Flurry library, we were ready to start collecting data.
In our code, we added a simple script that initiates the Flurry session after the device is ready: window.plugins.flurry.startSession(sessionkey). To ensure a unique session key for different environments (stage vs. production) and platforms (iOS vs. Android), we utilized a hook script to inject the necessary values.
By injecting the correct session key, we can track user behavior across various platforms and environments. This provides valuable insights into how users interact with our application, allowing us to make data-driven decisions to improve the overall experience.
In conclusion, swift app development requires more than just building an app – it's about understanding how users engage with your creation. By leveraging Flurry or similar analytics solutions, you can unlock valuable insights and drive growth for your PhoneGap/Cordova mobile application. Don't fly blind when releasing your app – use Flurry to collect usage statistics and make data-driven decisions.