Help setting up Ackee

[scooke]

@girish This is really nice thus far. I installed both Ackee and Umami, 24hours+ ago and with Ackee I'm still waiting for data to see if I installed everything correctly. With Umami, I chose the "Live View" option and BAM! Immediate display of myself meandering through my site. So, a win for Umami for sure.

[MooCloud_Matt]

@scooke
You need to enable an option to track yourself in Ackee, that's actually a good idea to ignore your IP if you have a low visit website.

[scooke]

@MooCloud_Matt Could you explain how I do that? I've read the docs at https://github.com/electerious/Ackee/blob/master/docs/Options.md#environment but when it comes to the CORS header section, ACKEE_ALLOW_ORIGIN="https://example.com" I don't know if example.com is supposed to be the domain where Ackee is, or if it's the domain that Ackee is tracking.

At any rate, I've set it to both domains I'm testing with (the domain where Ackee is, and the domain I'm tracking), and still there is no immediate feedback letting me know I've set it up right like there was with Umami.

[MooCloud_Matt]

@scooke
ACKEE_ALLOW_ORIGIN is the domain where the JS script will be able to track analytics.
for example, in our case is moocloud.ch

Then all the options are on the JS tracker side, not on ackee.
He you can find those option: https://github.com/electerious/ackee-tracker#-options

[scooke]

@MooCloud_Matt I apperciate you taking time to answer, but this still isn't clear to me. If I understand what you are saying, the domain that Ackee is installed on, say, ackee.example.com, does NOT have to be the same place where the JS script (I think it's called tracker.js, yes?) is installed? It could be at random.test.com (https:://random.test.com/tracker.js)?? If so, then in the env that we were talking about, then the ACKEE_ALLOW_ORIGIN is random.test.com, yes? In which case, ackee.example.com is merely the dashboard showing the results from the JS script at random.test.com?

If that is all accurate, sure, ok, makes sense I guess. But it makes more sense to me that everything that Ackee does remains on the same server and domain where Ackee is. I just don't see why someone would put the tracker.js on another server/domain...

Wait a second, another question came to mind. Is random.test.com/tracker.js the site that is being tracked?

[girish]

I forked this topic from the umami announcement thread.

@scooke Have you see our docs already - https://docs.cloudron.io/apps/ackee/#adding-a-domain ?

[scooke]

@girish You know, I think I understand now, but let me add this suggested rewording of the instructions. This is because, to my non-techie mind, ACKEE_ALLOW_ORIGIN sounds like it refers to my Ackee site, but it strikes me as weird that I have to "allow" it. The various instructions also remain unclear to me as to whether I am embedding the script in the tracked site, or the track that has Ackee installed. Anyway, the rewording:

---

**Adding a domain**
First, add a domain inside Ackee's Settings page. If the website where you've installed Ackee is www.cloudron.space, add it like so:


Next, add CORS configuration by editing /app/data/env using the File manager and adding the website where you've installed Ackee in ACKEE_ALLOW_ORIGIN.

(later)

Embed Ackee's tracker.js script in the website you wish to track. Be sure to replace the ackee URL and the domain ID. You can get the snippet below by clicking on the domain entry in Ackee's setting view as well.

---

In fact, the second sentence of the previous paragraph suddenly sounds to me like I now have to change the ackee url and domain id...???? Be sure to replace the ackee URL and the domain ID. But, why? Doesn't the site where ackee is installed, in your example, www.cloudron.space, remain the same for all tracker.js scripts? And in the docs, suddenly there is a new domain, analytics.cloudron.space... where did that come from? See, this isn't as clear as it may seem to you dev-types!

I may just uninstall this, seeing as conceptually it isn't clear to me. My GA shows activity on the domain I'm testing with, so does Umami, but after several days now nothing on Ackee.

[girish]

@scooke said in Help setting up Ackee:

ACKEE_ALLOW_ORIGIN sounds like it refers to my Ackee site, but it strikes me as weird that I have to "allow" it

Right. I don't know why Ackee doesn't do this automatically. Ideally, just adding the domain should suffice and it should adjust the CORS configuration automatically. But it doesn't.

I have reworded things a bit to explicitly say "tracked" in the docs. Can you check if it's any better now?

[robi]

In practice, I had to add each and every website I wanted tracked to the ACKEE_ALLOW_ORIGIN env line because it runs in a subdomain, and this got quite long all in one line.

You can't split this up either, unless you know how to concatenate env vars.

Ackee tracks ANY site that has a copy of its tracker.js script embedded in the site. Hence anyone download and use or mess with your stats.

That's why each site has it's own data-ackee-domain-id for ackee to separate things AND looks at the origin of the request, and if they don't match, rejects it.

[jdaviescoates]

@robi in short, it sounds like a pain, and @scooke's observation that by comparison umami just works is correct.

+1 for umami for me lovely and simple to set-up

[scooke]

@robi Yeah, this part here is what has been confusing me: "ANY site that has a copy of its tracker.js script embedded in the site"... The other analytics software out there that I've tried simply has the script url inserted before the closing /header of a site, not the actual js script in the code of the site! But once my head got around that the other terminology makes sense. But overall, I'll stick with Umami and even GA. I don't like the idea of sticking an actual piece of js script in my site(s). Thanks for this extra clarifying comment though!

[robi]

@scooke there are multiple ways to deploy it, see the docs..

One is to have the .js on each site, and cached or slipstreamed via HTTP/2 or QUIC which can be good if the site is on a CDN deployment

Another is to grab it from the ackee.domain.com/tracker.js (this is the way I use it.)

And one can use a CDN just for the tracker and other .js assets as well.

So not too weird or required to be weird

[scooke]

@robi You know, one benefit of these Forums is how much info and experience people share, which helps me learn more and more. Thank you again for your input.

[robi]

@scooke
You're very welcome