September 24, 2007

Google Analytics in AIR; That’s What I’m Talking About

Mark Hendrickson

38 comments »

Having just bought a Mac after ten years of Windows, I feel as though I have a heightened appreciation for products and services that are pleasurable to use. And while I love websites that implement Ajax or Flash effectively, few online destinations can match the usability of a well-designed desktop application.

That’s why I found Google Analytics AIR beta, publicly released on September 17th, to be such a breath of fresh air (no pun intended, really).

This unofficial AIR version of Google Analytics delivers the functionality of browser-based Google Analytics but with greater usability and a richer experience. If you haven’t heard of AIR (once named “Apollo”), it’s a platform developed by Adobe that enables web developers to deploy their web services outside of the browser so they function more like traditional applications.

This is the first AIR program that I have tested that really gets me excited about the platform. As a beta program, it’s not perfect (I ran into a few errors), but overall it has been executed very well. It’s also nice to see such a full-functional program developed using someone else’s API (in this case, Google’s).

Check out Google Analytics AIR beta and give the developer, Nico, your feedback to help make this thing even better. If you don’t already have AIR, you need to download it to use any AIR-base applications (as with Flash).

Thanks Orli.

Correction and Update: Google doesn’t actually have their own API for Analytics; Nico says he had to make his own to build this program (not exactly sure how that works).

He also says that both Adobe and Google are involved in this project now. Adobe has included the application in its Showcase program, and Google product managers and engineers are providing him with feedback and helping him make it more secure.

Nico says that beta 2 of Google Analytics AIR will be available around the time AIR beta 2 is released to the general public. He’s currently focusing on improved international support and the integration of AdWords.

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Comments

Let me try that as well…sounds interesting.
http://vidsonly.blogspot.com

 

Google analytics on air sound very innovative, I’ll to get the best out of it.

 

Sounds cool, I will take a look.

 

If you want to see a live full bottle flex app take a look at http://www.dynamicform.com.au. Need to login to see the goodness and better during Australian racing times when the live data is flowing - AEST 1pm-5pm

Full dashbord pulling live odds from some 20 bookies with a heap of other stuff. Impressive app.

 

Please make Techcrunch40 videos available..
Digg this : http://digg.com/tech_news/Requ.....ilable/who

 

This is about your switch to MACs. Just started to read techcrunch, and also thinking of buying a mac. Which one did you buy? if you have a link to an article about your experience would like to check it out.
Kind Regards,
Don

 

I’ve been using this for a while now.

It’s still clearly in beta, but this is a great application non the less.

 

Very buggy still but I can’t wait for the final product… Google is great!

 

ding…ding…ding…ding…

(the sound of Nico’s incoming e-mails asking him if he wants a new job)

 

Looks quite slick.

One minor quibble — the article states that “it’s also nice to see such a full-functional program developed using someone else’s API (in this case, Google’s).” However, per the Nico website, it is actually a custom API that was developed for this product.

As far as I know, Google has yet to release an official API for Analytics, which is unfortunate as it’d be great to get direct access to that data.

 

The great thing about AIR is there’s no ‘Please wait, loading’ with it. Very nice app, impressive.

 

What a great product! This is something I have though “Why hasn’t anyone come up with this” for a while. Not really my cup of tea in business otherwise I would have pursued developing it myself.

Glad I didn’t now knowing google would have been a competitor!

 

The world’s worst air is my hometown New York City…. Groundzero, central park, horse dumping in street,

All cultures(blacks,whites, Asians, and almost everyone) have strange odors

– Washington height where you smell horrible mexican or spanish armpit,
– Middle village where you smell hindu body ordor
– Jackson Heights where you smell Hispanic cockroach breath,
– Soho where you smell Caucasian garlic, socks, and feet.
– Upper midtown where you smell gay with semen ordor.
– Chinatown where you smell dumped chinese food.
– Harlem where you smell drug addict and can’t cook food.
– KKK private town where you smell horse anus and asbestos body.

New York Air is terrible…. If you don’ t think so. Please visit New York and smell whatever you want. Don’t forget to smell Staten island waste land, upper new york bay where boats dump garbage, all over the places.

 

Does Adobe AIR support Linux?

Adobe AIR 1.0 will not be available on Linux. We plan to release Linux support shortly after the 1.0. release.

While we had originally planned to support Linux in the 1.0 timeframe, we have had to wait on the core Flash Player’s support for Linux to be finalized.

 

This tool looks good. But I think we have to wait something more stable.

 

I knew this sort of thing is coming. GoogleA is already such a killer app already, but this is the sort of thing which can start adding sufficient utility to the platform and make it something I can further my independence from Windows on. That is, once they come out with an AIR runtime for Linux.

See, I have not been motivated at all to check out much with AIR so far, as all I keep seeing is half-thought-out Digg widgets and more things that can tell me what the weather is. I’m in L.A, and I know what the weather will be 365 days in advance, so that doesn’t help. But something that can help me get my job done, then — well — then that starts making this a pervasive platform.

 

I live new york…. How to Fresh clean the air?

If I use AXE Effect Deodorant Body spray on people… They would give very attractive squirrels and pigeons to like them. How do you make clean air?

Any GPL tools?

 

Nice work Orli - I hope you get a job out of Google!

 

I hope he can develop one for clicky (www.getclicky.com)

They have an actual API, and great data…

 

If you are looking for an analytics service that actually has an API, check out Clicky:

http://getclicky.com/help/api

/shameless_plug

 

Reinvigorate too has a very nice real-time web statistics desktop client.

 

Oop, James beat me to it. :)

 

I assume you have to give up your Google Account information to use it? If it’s using a “custom API”, I’d be wary of giving up that information to a third party, as nice as the app may be.

 

if you want to be begging adobe for upgrades and bug fixes three years from now, keep using AIR

there is a reason we code open source to open standards children

you would think a decade of being raped by windows bugs and pointless osx updates you would have figured out why closed proprietary platforms are bad…

 

“…….greater usability and a richer experience. ”

kidding me? I failed to see where the greater usability and richer experience in the program as of yet. sounds like advertising to me. I do see more potential at a later stage, but I found the online version of the analytics more easily to use at this stage.

 

This will be great to try, thanks for the link.

 

All Apple compatable software is beta and buggy!
I am sooooo dissapointed in some of you guys. Didn’t you get the policy note about not mentioning it if you have a Mac, and, if you do only complain!
Thinking of ripping ADs from TC!
http://fakesteveballmer.blogspot.com

 

This app is awesome!
Only if Google had real time stats.

I would agree if someone wrote for clicky APIs. Their service is far better than Ganalytics.

 

#5 - Jim: They’re coming; sorry for the wait (we’ve been dealing with unforeseen technical issues)

#6 - Don: 15″ MacBook Pro. I haven’t written anything about it, but so far I have been very happy with the purchase. 10x better than my old Dell.

 

An important question, has anybody checked to make sure this is secure? Its not sending our Google account details back to a non-Google server?

 

Niray and Bob;
It’s a client side API, so all request are send directly to the Google Analytics server. There’s no proxy or anything like that.
The app has also been tested by engineers from Google Analytics and I assure you they wouldn’t let me continue with this if it was not secure.

cheers
Nico

 

Thanks.

I’ll be using it then, very nice … what stunned by was how an application like this could fit in a 940KB file.

 

thanks for your clarification regarding the API, Nicolas. It is answer my question too. I’m starting to like this app. Thanks for sharing, Nico :)

 

WOW! Very slick and great UI and look. Works very well :-)

Thanks muchly!

 

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