SiteCatalyst was my first love coming into the world of analytics, and while the last version of my site offered quite a few posts on the subject, my clean slate approach to the new website means I need to reiterate the helpful hints about working with Adobe SiteCatalyst. I recently created and updated two tools to help those who implement SiteCatalyst:

ClickMap Debugger Data Beacon Analyzer

ClickMap Debugger

The ClickMap Debugger tool has actually been around for quite awhile now, but it’s still useful for those who want to better understand link tracking data, how it’s collected, and how it should appear in reporting and visualization tools. The default loaded view is the most simplest and user-friendly interface that should correlate with what you would find in SiteCatalyst’s Clickmap report . It runs as a JavaScript bookmarklet, displaying an overlay box that follows your mouse cursor as it moves around the screen. Based upon the element your mouse cursor hovers over, you will see pertinent Clickmap information regarding that specific element. The Analytics menu of this site now has a link to the documentation and bookmarklet for your debugging pleasure? Here’s a direct link for the lazy: ClickMap Documentation and Installer

Data Beacon Analyzer

I am really excited about this one. As the Internet becomes less browser-centric again, understanding the context of measurement data beacons is crucial. While Adobe currently offers a good Digital Pulse Debugger in the form of another JavaScript bookmarklet, this unfortunately becomes useless when you are a client that wants to debug non-browser SiteCatalyst implementations for devices like mobile phones, tablets, and gaming consoles. Enter scdebugger.com, a prototype web-as-a-service debugging tool that examines your data beacons, checking for errors and displaying the information in a friendly format. All you have to do is redirect your data beacons by setting s.trackingServer to scdebugger.com. It can even forward those data beacons on to your actual SiteCatalyst data collection servers so you can see the reporting data in the interface, as well. Learn more and try out the alpha version here: SCDebugger Alpha