Telemetry.js

🎲 Privacy-friendly visit tracking for Node.js

Highlights

<2kb visit tracking library without database
100% server-side
100% open-source
Detects & ignores bots
Privacy-friendly at its core
GDPR-compliant

Install

$ npm install telemetry.js

Usage

var telemetry = require('telemetry.js');

Track visits with:

telemetry.trackVisit(req);

That's it! Add this line of code before you respond to a request and it will track every request to the visits.json file.

How it works

Unlike other web analytics tools (e.g. Google Analytics), Telemetry does not work in the visitor's browser. Instead it parses the HTTP request header and works fully server-side.

When a user sends a request, your server processes the request header through the trackVisit() function.

Telemetry then reads the client user agent, including browser, operating system & device type, and saves the parsed information as a visit to the visits.json file.

For every request, Telemetry creates a visit with a lot of useful information.

technology - browser, OS, and device type
location - country, region, and city

This is how a visit usually looks like in your visits.json file:

    {
      "browser": {
        "name": "Firefox",
        "version": "59.0"
      },
      "os": {
        "name": "macOS",
        "version": "10.13"
      },
      "device": "desktop",
      "country": "GB",
      "region": "ENG",
      "city": "London",
      "timestamp": 1546300800
    }

Privacy Fundamentals

Telemetry does not collect any personal information and thus it does not save client's IP addresses. Instead, it looks up the client's location (country, region & city) via the geoip-lite library without actually saving the IP address.

Many web browsers give users the option to signal their tracking preferences with the Do Not Track request header. Operators are not obliged to comply with that request, however Telemetry complies with DNT-requests and ignores those visitors.

What's Next?

Visual dashboard
Track referrers
Event tracking
Minimize data footprint
Alternative storage options

yhdesai/telemetry.js