Initial SDK setup

Install using gradle

If you use gradle as your build system, you can fetch the library from our private nexus repository.

Add the FollowAnalytics repository to your build.gradle repositories.

repositories {
    ...
    maven {
        url 'https://nexus.follow-apps.com/nexus/content/repositories/releases/'
    }
}

Add the FollowAnalytics SDK to your module's build.gradle dependencies.

dependencies {
    ...
    implementation "com.followapps.android:sdk:5.2.0"
    ...
}

The FollowAnalytics dependencies

For information the FollowAnalytics sdk depends on the following libraries. If you're using gradle, they are automatically added by the manifest merging process.

implementation "com.android.support:support-v4:27.0.1"
implementation "com.android.support:cardview-v7:27.0.1"
implementation "com.google.android.gms:play-services-gcm:11.6.0"
implementation "com.google.android.gms:play-services-location:11.6.0"
implementation "me.leolin:ShortcutBadger:1.1.19@aar"

Permissions

The SDK adds automatically the following permissions to your manifest.

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.INTERNET"/>
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.WAKE_LOCK"/>
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE" />

If the minimum version of the sdk android is lower than 14, you must add the permission GET_TASKS

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.GET_TASKS"/>

To allow the SDK to log the user location

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_COARSE_LOCATION"/>

To use geofencing feature

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION" />
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.RECEIVE_BOOT_COMPLETED"/>

For best user experience, you can follow the guidelines as described here.

Initialize with your API key

To add your API key to your app project, add the following line in your Manifest file, within the application tag:

<application>
    [...]
   <meta-data android:name="FAID" android:value="YOUR_API_KEY"/>
    [...]
 </application>

The FollowAnalytics SDK must be initialized in the onCreate() method of an Application class. This allows the SDK to be constantly initialized, whether the user launches the app himself, or if the Android system wakes any receiver or service of the application (for example for a push notification).

Open your Application subclass, or create a new one, and add the following lines to override the onCreate method:

public class MyAwesomeApplication extends Application {
    [...]
    @Override
    public void onCreate() {
        super.onCreate();
        FollowAnalytics.init(this);
        [...]
    }
    [...]
}

If you just created an Application subclass, do not forget to declare it in your AndroidManifest.xml file:

<application
    android:name=".MyAwesomeApplication"
    [...] />

Register for notifications

The FollowAnalytics SDK supports push notifications based on Google Cloud Messaging. To ensure notifications cannot be caught by other applications than yours, please follow the steps below.

1. Add the following permissions to your manifest:

   <permission android:name="%YOUR_APP_PACKAGE_NAME%.permission.C2D_MESSAGE"
                   android:protectionLevel="signature" />
    <uses-permission android:name="%YOUR_APP_PACKAGE_NAME%.permission.C2D_MESSAGE" />
   

2. Add the GCM Receiver to your manifest

   <receiver
               android:name="com.google.android.gms.gcm.GcmReceiver"
               android:exported="true"
               android:permission="com.google.android.c2dm.permission.SEND"
               >
           <intent-filter>
               <action android:name="com.google.android.c2dm.intent.RECEIVE"/>
               <!-- for Gingerbread GSF backward compat -->
               <action android:name="com.google.android.c2dm.intent.REGISTRATION"/>
               <category android:name="%YOUR_APP_PACKAGE_NAME%"/>
           </intent-filter>
    </receiver>
   

Validate

The SDK has a Validator that will ensure that everything is properly configured.

No matter whether you use jar or gradle, you should check your configuration. The SDK allows you to use the Validator in two ways:

1. The validator can be displayed in a dialog using the following code

   if(Configuration.isApplicationInDebug()){
       InstallationChecker.displaySDKConfigurationCheckingInDialog(ActivityContext);
   }
   

2. Alternatively, you can have it displayed in the console

   if(Configuration.isApplicationInDebug()){
       InstallationChecker.showSDKConfigurationInLog(this);
   }
   

Logging

Tag events

Regular, native event logging

The SDK allows you to log events happening in your code. These are the two methods you can call on the SDK:

// Log an event without details
FollowAnalytics.logEvent(String eventName);
FollowAnalytics.logError(String errorName);

// Log an event with String details
FollowAnalytics.logEvent(String eventName, String details);
FollowAnalytics.logError(String errorName, String details);

// Log an event with Map details
// This is useful to pass pairs of key-values into a single event
// Note that this Map should only contains basic types as values, including
// Integer, Long, Float, Double, String, Boolean
FollowAnalytics.logEvent(String eventName, Map<String, ?> details);
FollowAnalytics.logError(String errorName, Map<String, ?> details);

Use the name as the unique identifier of your tag, use the details section to add specific details, context. Events can be renamed later: the name that you give to your event here can be overridden in the FollowAnalytics UI.

The details field can either be a String or a Map, so that you can associated multiple key-values for additional context.

For instance, logging the appearance of a view could be done the following ways:

FollowAnalytics.logEvent("Product Page", "Product #42");
FollowAnalytics.logError("Error log", "This is an error!");

You may use a Map for details. In this case, the Map values should only contain basic java types, such as Integer, Long, Float, Double, String, and Boolean.

HashMap<String, ?> detailsMap = new HashMap<String, Object>();
detailsMap.put("product_id", 42);
detailsMap.put("product_category", "Jeans");
FollowAnalytics.logEvent("Add product to cart", detailsMap);

In debug mode, the SDK will acknowledge the saving by writing in the console whatever it receives.

If the parameters sent to these methods are over 60Kb, the method will refuse them, return NO, and write a message in the console, if it is running in debug mode.

Logging from a web view

If you happen to use a web view to display elements of your app, you can also tag events and errors from within your HTML/JS code. To do so:

1. You can use the FAWebView a subclass of native WebView.

2. Use the following method calls in your web page code to save events. For instance, you can do:

   <a onclick="FollowAnalytics.logEvent('My event');">Send event without detail</a>
   <a onclick="FollowAnalytics.logEvent('My event', 'My event details');">Send event with detail</a>
   <a onclick="FollowAnalytics.logError('fromWebView without detail');">Send error without detail</a>
   <a onclick="FollowAnalytics.logError('fromWebView with detail','Error detail');">Send error with detail</a>
   

3. User Attributes

    :::html
    <div class="button" onclick="FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.setFirstName('Isaac');">Set first name</div><br>
    <div class="button" onclick="FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.setLastName('Newton');">Set last name</div><br>
    <div class="button" onclick="FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.setEmail('ali@followanalytics.com');">Set email</div><br>
    <div class="button" onclick="FollowAnalytics.getDeviceId(displayDeviceID);">Get Device ID</div><br>
   

4. InApp properties

     :::html
     <div class="button" onclick="FollowAnalytics.InApp.pauseCampaignDisplay();">Pause Campaign</div><br>
     <div class="button" onclick="FollowAnalytics.InApp.resumeCampaignDisplay();">Resume Campaign</div><br>
   

Make sure to test if FollowAnalytics object exists with if (typeof FollowAnalytics !== 'undefined'). This way, you can reuse the exact same HTML code for your mobile web site without impact.

User ID and attributes

User ID

If users can sign in somewhere in your app, you can specify their identifier to the SDK. This way, you will be able to relate crashes to specific users, link your users between FollowAnalytics and your CRM, and more.

This identifier is usually an e-mail address, client identifier, phone number, or anything else that uniquely ties your customers to you.

To register the user identifier, use:

FollowAnalytics.setUserId(String UserId);

If you want to remove the user identifier (in case of a sign out for instance) use the following method:

FollowAnalytics.setUserId(null);

Predefined attributes

The SDK allows to set values for both custom and predefined attributes.

For predefined attributes, the SDK has the following properties:

setLastName(String lastName);
setFirstName(String firstName);
setRegion(String region);
setCountry(String country);
setCity(String city);
setCountry(String country);
setEmail(String email);
...

They are "predefined" in the sense that they will be attached to default fields on your user profiles.

For example, to set user Joe's city to "Paris", you would proceed as follows:

FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.setCity("Paris");
FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.setFirstName("Joe");

Custom attributes

Set a custom attribute

To set your custom attributes, you can use methods that are adapted for each type: setInt, setString,setBoolean, setDate, setDateTime and setDouble.

For example, to set the user's job:

FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.setString("key_job", "Taxi driver");

Delete a custom attribute value

You can delete the value of an attribute using its key. For example, to delete the user's job:

FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.clear("key_job");

Set of attributes

You can add or remove an item to or from a set of attributes.

To add an item:

FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.addToSet("fruits","apple");
FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.addToSet("fruits","strawberry");
FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.addToSet("fruits","lemon");

To remove an item:

FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.removeFromSet("fruits","lemon"); // Removes "lemon" from set of fruits.

And to clear a set:

FollowAnalytics.UserAttributes.clearSet("fruits");  #Removes all the items from the set.

For further information, refer to the SDK header file.

Advanced Use Cases

Deep-linking: URL, Parameters

Campaigns created through FollowAnalytics allow to deep link to content in your application or to others application. You can use either an App Link, or use a customized key-value parameters that are forwarded to your code.

App Links

The SDK introduced the possibility to use direct App Links like twitter://messages, which will send you to the corresponding screen inside of the Twitter application.

You're able to access the functionality by enabling the Deep Linking switch in our UI, when creating a campaign. There you'll find the field App Link that expects you to enter these type of url schemas. It can either be an URL Schema to an external application or for your own application.

Customizing deep-link parameters

If you don't want to implement it as google's recommendation, please follow the content below.

In FollowAnalytics campaigns through our platform, you can specify deep-linking parameters, e.g. in your push messages or for in-app button actions.

These parameters are given to the developer's code by the SDK. It is then up to the developer to implement the deep-linking in the app (specific path of screens, format of the arguments, etc.).

To obtain these parameters, you can extend the FollowAnalytics.DefaultMessageHandler class, like in the following example:

public class CustomMessageHandler extends FollowAnalytics.DefaultMessageHandler {

     /**
     * This method is executed when no App Link was set but, instead, only key-values were set.
     **/
     @Override
     public void onPushMessageClicked(Context context, Map<String, String> data) {
         String value1 = data.get("a_custom_param_key");
         if(value1 !=null && data.get(value1).equals("a_custom_param_value_expected")){
             //Execute the code for the customized deep-link with a key : "a_custom_param_key" and a value : "a_custom_param_value_expected"
             Intent intent = new Intent(context, SpecificActivity.class);
             intent.setFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK);
             context.startActivity(intent);
         }else{
            //Let the SDK handle the notification
            super.onPushMessageClicked(context, data);
         }

     }

    /**
     * This method is executed when an App Link was, at least, set (through the clients portal).
     **/
       @Override
         public void onPushMessageClicked(Context context, String url, Map<String, String> data) {
            //Do something with the url
         }

     @Override
     public void onInAppMessageClicked(Context context, String buttonText, Map<String, String> data) {
         // Same as the above method, but from a in-app message!
     }
}

If you chose to define a custom MessageHandler, you must declare it in your Application manifest as meta-data:

<application>
    [...]
    <meta-data android:name="com.followanalytics.deeplinking.handler" android:value="fully_qualified_identifier_to_your_class"/>
   [...]
</application>;

Through the key value format, FollowAnalytics supports both standardized deep-linking (by defining the key you'll always use to give the path), and more direct parameter passing for simpler use cases integrations.

Regular deep-linking is usually implemented using a Router, that will handle the URL called on the app and translate it into the display of the right page, with the right content.

Control over campaigns

Pausing in-app campaigns

You can prevent in-app campaigns from being displayed on certain views of your app. This can be useful when you are displaying a media content, or if the topmost screen is only shown for a few seconds, for instance.

Any campaign supposed to be displayed when the mechanism is paused is stacked and shown as soon as it is resumed.

To tell the SDK to prevent the display of rich campaigns, and then to activate it back, use the following methods:

FollowAnalytics.InApp.pauseCampaignDisplay();  # will pause campaign display
FollowAnalytics.InApp.resumeCampaignDisplay();  # will resume campaign display

Custom push notifications

If you need to customize your push notifications, you have to extend this class FollowAnalytics.DefaultMessageHandler and override the method onPushMessageNotificationBuilding(...) to the class that you created.

For example:

public class FollowPushHandler extends FollowAnalytics.DefaultMessageHandler {

    @Override
    public void onPushMessageNotificationBuilding(Context context, NotificationCompat.Builder notificationBuilder,  FollowAnalytics.Message message) {
     //customize the notification
    }
}

Then, add to the manifest file the path of the class that extends FollowAnalytics.DefaultMessageHandler as a meta-data tag under the aplication tag. For example:

<meta-data android:name=“com.followanalytics.deeplinking.handler” android:value=“the_full_path_of_your_message_FollowPushHandler”/>

Now that everything is set up, customize your notification under the method onPushMessageNotificationBuilding.

An example of adding buttons to the notification is available below.

@Override
    public void onPushMessageNotificationBuilding(Context context, NotificationCompat.Builder notificationBuilder, FollowAnalytics.Message message) {
    super.onPushMessageNotificationBuilding(context, notificationBuilder, message);
    if (message.getCategory().equalsIgnoreCase("social")) {
        PendingIntent pendingIntentActions1 = null; //your pendingIntent when user click on button like
        PendingIntent pendingIntentActions2 =  null; //your pendingIntent when user click on button comment
        NotificationCompat.Action action1 = new NotificationCompat.Action.Builder(android.R.drawable.ic_menu_send, "Like", pendingIntentActions1).build();
        NotificationCompat.Action action2 = new NotificationCompat.Action.Builder(android.R.drawable.ic_menu_help, "comment", pendingIntentActions2).build();
        notificationBuilder.addAction(action1);
        notificationBuilder.addAction(action2);
    }
}

Custom handling of rich campaigns

Rich campaigns can be handled directly by the application code, instead of being showed automatically by the SDK. The behavior is defined when creating the campaign, using the "automatically display content" switch.

For campaigns where the content is not handled by FollowAnalytics, you will need to extend com.followapps.android.CustomRichCampaignBaseReceiver and declare it in your AndroidManifest.xml. You'll need to use an intent-filter on BROADCAST_RICH_CAMPAIGNS_ACTION. For instance:

<receiver android:name=".RichCampaignDataReceiver" >
    <intent-filter>
        <action android:name="%YOUR_APP_PACKAGE_NAME%.BROADCAST_RICH_CAMPAIGNS_ACTION" />
    </intent-filter>
</receiver>

Where %YOUR_APP_PACKAGE_NAME% is your application package name.

The method onRichCampaignDataReceived must be overridden. Rich campaign parameters are provided as method arguments:

• Campaign title: title
• Campaign URL: url
• Custom Parameters associated to the campaign: customParams

Embedded View

Configuration

In your layout.xml, add the following configuration where you intend to display :

               <com.followapps.android.view.EmbeddedView
                android:layout_width="match_parent"
                android:layout_height="wrap_content"
                android:visibility="gone"
                >
                </com.followapps.android.view.EmbeddedView>

The sdk will handle them automatically.

Enable message archiving

FollowAnalytics SDK allows you to store all campaigns and push notifications received by your application, making them available to your custom usage. To enable this feature, add the following line in the application manifest under the tag application

• You can choose to enable the message archiving as following: -

  <meta-data android:name="com.followanalytics.message.push.enable" android:value="true" />
  <meta-data android:name="com.followanalytics.message.inapp.enable" android:value="true" />
  

• To get all in-app or push messages

  FollowAnalytics.InApp.getAll()       //for in-app messages
  FollowAnalytics.Push.getAll()        //for push notifications
  

• To get an in-app or a push message by identifier

   FollowAnalytics.InApp.get(id_campaign)     //for an in-app message
   FollowAnalytics.Push.get(id_campaign)    //for a push notification
  

• To delete an in-app or a push message

  FollowAnalytics.InApp.delete(id_campaign)    //for an in-app message
  FollowAnalytics.Push.delete(id_campaign)   //for a push notification
  

• To mark as read an in-app or a push message

   FollowAnalytics.InApp.markAsRead(id_campaign)    //for an in-app message
   FollowAnalytics.Push.markAsRead(id_campaign)   //for a push notification
  

• To mark as unread an in-app or a push message

    FollowAnalytics.InApp.markAsUnread(id_campaign)    //for an in-app message
   FollowAnalytics.Push.markAsUnread(id_campaign)    //for a push notification
  

Firebase integration

If you use Firebase to manage your push notifications, FollowAnalytics SDK doesn't handle it with the latest version.

However, you can use a Firebase implementation (your own) and GCM implementation (from FollowAnalytics SDK) independently with no communication between FA SDK and FCM services.

Working with multiple GCMs

If you are already using GCM in your application, you will have to check the sender of each notification, as it can now come from different providers (e.g. you and FollowAnalytics).

Before beggining the implementation, let's summarize the objectives and ideas that the application will do with multiple GCM.

1. The application must retrieve the token (push notification) independently of any sender ID (multiple sender ID) and send it, optionally, to a server.

2. The application will be able to receive one or mutiple push notifications, and treat them separatly.

Manifest application

1. Remove any GCM Receiver implemented in your project (FollowAnalytics SDK will implement it automatically). For instance :

   <!--REMOVE THE RECEIVER-->
   <receiver android:name="com.microsoft.windowsazure.notifications.NotificationsBroadcastReceiver"
       android:permission="com.google.android.c2dm.permission.SEND">
       <intent-filter>
           <action android:name="com.google.android.c2dm.intent.RECEIVE" />
           <category android:name= "com.followanalytics.sdk.azme.integration" />
       </intent-filter>
   </receiver>
   <!--             -->
   

2. Implement a Service that will receive all the push notifications. For instance :

   <!--ADD THE SERVICE-->
   <service
       android:name=".OtherExternalPushService"
       android:exported="false">
       <intent-filter>
           <action android:name="com.google.android.c2dm.intent.RECEIVE"/>
       </intent-filter>
   </service>
   <!--             -->
   

3. Make sure that GCM permissions are implemented.

   <permission android:name="<PACKAGE_NAME>.permission.C2D_MESSAGE" android:protectionLevel="signature" />
   <uses-permission android:name="<PACKAGE_NAME>.permission.C2D_MESSAGE"/>
   

4. Finally, make sure that you are able to retrieve the token with different providers by declaring the correct Service. For instance, this is a Service that retrieves the token for Azure push notification system:

   <service android:name=".azure.MyInstanceIDService" android:exported="false">
       <intent-filter>
           <action android:name="com.google.android.gms.iid.InstanceID"/>
       </intent-filter>
   </service>
   

   or

   // This service retrieves the token also
   <service
       android:name=".azure.RegistrationIntentService"
       android:exported="false">
   </service>
   

Gradle application

1. Remove the plugin for GCM if available :

   //apply plugin: 'com.google.gms.google-services'
   

2. Remove the dependencies from GCM (FollowAnalytics SDK already adds it).

   //implementation 'com.google.android.gms:play-services-gcm:11.+'
   

Project, Java class implementation

Now that we settled the Manifest and Gradle files, let's implement the classes.

1. Implement the Service extended to GcmListenerService (declared previously in the manifest). For instance :

   public class OtherExternalPushService extends GcmListenerService{
       public static final int NOTIFICATION_ID = 123;
       private NotificationManager mNotificationManager;
       NotificationCompat.Builder mBuilder;
   
       public OtherExternalPushService() {
           super();
       }
   
       @TargetApi(26)
       @Override
       public void onMessageReceived(String from, Bundle data) {
           super.onMessageReceived(from, data);
   
           //Treat every sender Id that the application might have (for instance, this is a push notification from Azure Microsoft)
           if(from.equals(NotificationSettings.SenderId))){
   
               //Do whatever you need to do for this message (parse the message, send to the notification manager, etc...)
   
               mNotificationManager = (NotificationManager) this.getApplicationContext().getSystemService(Context.NOTIFICATION_SERVICE);
   
               if(Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.O) {
                   //----------CREATE CHANNEL
                   // The id of the channel.
                   String id = "my_channel_01";
                   // The user-visible name of the channel.
                   CharSequence name = "Azure Channel";
                   // The user-visible description of the channel.«
                   String description = "This is a description";
                   int importance = NotificationManager.IMPORTANCE_HIGH;
                   NotificationChannel mChannel = new NotificationChannel(id, name, importance);
                   // Configure the notification channel.
                   mChannel.setDescription(description);
                   mChannel.enableLights(true);
                   // Sets the notification light color for notifications posted to this
                   // channel, if the device supports this feature.
                   mChannel.setLightColor(Color.RED);
                   mChannel.enableVibration(true);
                   mChannel.setVibrationPattern(new long[]{100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 400, 300, 200, 400});
                   mNotificationManager.createNotificationChannel(mChannel);
                   //----------END CREATE CHANNEL
   
                   mBuilder =
                           new NotificationCompat.Builder(this.getApplicationContext(), id)
                                   .setSmallIcon(R.mipmap.ic_launcher)
                                   .setContentTitle("Notification Hub Demo Azure")
                                   .setStyle(new NotificationCompat.BigTextStyle()
                                           .bigText(data.getString(PushManager.BUNDLE_KEY_MESSAGE)))
                                   .setContentText(data.getString(PushManager.BUNDLE_KEY_MESSAGE));
               }else{
                   mBuilder =
                           new NotificationCompat.Builder(this.getApplicationContext())
                                   .setSmallIcon(R.mipmap.ic_launcher)
                                   .setContentTitle("Notification Hub Demo Azure")
                                   .setStyle(new NotificationCompat.BigTextStyle()
                                           .bigText(data.getString(PushManager.BUNDLE_KEY_MESSAGE)))
                                   .setContentText(data.getString(PushManager.BUNDLE_KEY_MESSAGE));
               }
               mNotificationManager.notify(NOTIFICATION_ID+(new Random().nextInt()), mBuilder.build());
           }else{
               // As there is no more sender id to treat, this is a FollowAnalytics message, let's inject the message to FollowAnalytics SDK, by using the following function
   
               Log.d("OtherExternalPushServi","Sender id :"+from);
               FollowAnalytics.processFollowAnalyticsPush(this, data.getString(PushManager.BUNDLE_KEY_MESSAGE));
           }
       }
   }
   

Now that everything is implemented, you can use/test push notifications with multiple GCM.

An example of a project with multiple GCM is available here : Github

Misc

Opt-out

The FollowAnalytics SDK allows to handle opt-out states for different features.

Flags

The SDK supplies methods to change some authorization flags:

boolean authorized = true;

// authorized to log events
FollowAnalytics.setCollectLogsAuthorization(authorized);

// authorized to log location events
FollowAnalytics.setCollectLocationLogsAuthorization(boolean authorized);

// authorized to receive push notifications
FollowAnalytics.setPushNotificationsEnabled(boolean authorized);

Note that for logging locations events, both the collect logs and collect location logs authorizations must be true. In practice, the location logs are collected if and only if FollowApps.canCollectLocationLogs() returns true.

Proguard

If you need to obfuscate and/or shrink your app before Google Play publication, be sure you protect the FollowAnalytics SDK, otherwise logs won't be sent.

Here is the ProGuard configuration:

-keep class com.followanalytics.** { *; }
-keep interface com.followapps.android.** { *; }