Tracking Pixel in Plugin

  • Resolved Brian Wendt

    (@ontodevelopment)


    11 years, 11 months ago

    Long time developer, first time publisher. I just got my first plugin on hosted here on ww.wp.xz.cn and quickly saw my download counter go up. I doubt they are legitimate downloads because there isn’t much demand for what I built.

    I’m curious if it is permitted to ad a tracking pixel to the plugin’s admin page so that I can get a more accurate count. I suppose I could also see which websites are using the plugin and how they are implementing it which would help for future development.

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)
  • esmi

    (@esmi)

    11 years, 11 months ago

    No – that’s not permitted.

    Thread Starter Brian Wendt

    (@ontodevelopment)

    11 years, 11 months ago

    Thanks esmi, I see that you are a moderator so you are speaking from authority.

    esmi

    (@esmi)

    11 years, 11 months ago

    Here perhaps but I should point out that I’m not part of the plugin review team. That said, I’ve gone through those review guidelines quite a few times in the past and they do clearly state that “phoning home” is not allowed.

    I appreciate that it can be frustrating not knowing how many people are actually using your plugin as opposed to just downloading it but, at the present time, there isn’t much we can do about that. It’s fairly common for downloads of new plugins to peak when they are first released as they will feature on the https://ww.wp.xz.cn/plugins/browse/new/ page. I can only imagine that some people monitor that page and do download new plugins to try them out.

    Evan Herman

    (@eherman24)

    11 years, 11 months ago

    You’re not allowed any tracking information inside of your plugins. Thre are, however, a few plugins which give the user the ability to toggle on or off tracking.

    I believe giving the user to option is one work around to allowing tracking information in plugins, but I don’t use any tracking features in my plugins so I can’t speak from experience.

    Thread Starter Brian Wendt

    (@ontodevelopment)

    11 years, 11 months ago

    Good point, I read that but what all counted as phoning home. Plugins like All-in-One Event Calendar have images that are hosted on their domain which could technically be used to track usage.

    Thanks for your time, esmi.

    Thread Starter Brian Wendt

    (@ontodevelopment)

    11 years, 11 months ago

    I don’t need continued tracking, so maybe I could just add a link that has the domain-name embedded that they can click to check in? Optional action for the plugin user.

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)

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