Show HN: HeatMap.TV – Realtime Google Analytics Heatmap for Big-Screen TVs | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: HeatMap.TV – Realtime Google Analytics Heatmap for Big-Screen TVs

heatmap.tv

51 pointsFileformat17 comments

Do you:

  • Have websites or apps that get a lot of traffic?
  • Have a huge TV in your office or living room?
  • Use Google Analytics?  With multiple accounts/properties?

Watch the location of your users in real-time and impress your friends, colleagues and investors as your traffic swells across the region or perhaps the globe!

Let me know what you think!

As already mentioned, the Github link is broken.

Additionally, there are 3 CTAs on the featured page, all of which go to https://www.heatmap.tv/ga.html which prompts users to login to Google Analytics.

The FAQ assures visitors who ask "Is my data safe?"

  > Your data is only accessed by the browser, not by the
  > Heatmap.TV server. If you are concerned about the security
  > of the browser, I suggest making adding a new user to Google
  > Analytics with read-only permission to just the properties
  > that should be displayed.

but since the Github repo link doesn't work, visitors cannot know which properties should be read-only.

Finally, there is a Google ad featured on the FAQ for

  > World Class Math Education - K-12, Here In Fremont
  > Award-winning after school math program offers strong
  > math curriculum. landing.russianschool.com/Mission-Viejo

which doesn't necessarily inspire confidence.

EDIT: Remove rhetorical request.

> github link

I'll get it working shortly, but it is a static website and all the functionality is in a single page ("ga.html"), so "view source" will show you everything that github will.

> which properties should be read-only

When I say "properties", I'm talking about the Google Analytics accounts, properties & views. You don't want to leave a PC/TV logged in with admin rights to GA, so the sensible thing is to add a new user just for the PC/TV with read access to the GA stuff you want to show.

I sure hope people aren't looking in my awful source to try to do anything.

I couldn't understand what it does. Also, Github link is broken. https://github.com/fileformat/heatmaptv

FAQ updated, github repo now public

Doesn't seem to work for me. Asks me to log in to Google, I choose my account then it goes back and shows an empty list of sites. Never got a prompt to approve any permissions.

The Google account needs to have rights to view stuff in Google Analytics.

There definitely could be problems with the Google Auth, and it probably only works on newer browsers (I have tested on Chrome and Firefox).

Do you see any errors in the console logs?

It gets a 403 on https://www.googleapis.com/analytics/v3/management/accountSu... after logging in. I am signed in to multiple Google accounts, although the primary account is also the one I use with analytics.

"{"error":{"errors":[{"domain":"global","reason":"insufficientPermissions","message":"Insufficient Permission"}],"code":403,"message":"Insufficient Permission"}}"

I wasn't prompted to approve any permissions so this doesn't seem surprising.

Looks like you need to replace "scope: 'profile'" with "scope: context.SCOPE" in your gapi.client.init call.

Fixed. Thanks!

I'm not sure what was going on. It was definitely working in some scenarios, since I can see active users (with Heatmap.TV, naturally).

The Google Auth stuff has been a complete nightmare.

I didn't find a description of what it does. Does it show on a map where visitors are coming from? Maybe it would be worth adding a fourth bullet point on the homepage.

Hmmm... Is the big image on the home page not showing up? It is a screenshot of it in action on some of my websites.

It shows up and it's the only thing that eventually made me guess what's the service is about. A short sentence and it's no guesses :-)

Very neat! Nice work and it was really quick to check out.

This looks especially cool in OpsBrowser 3D (disclosure - my companies product) which provides a 3D "big screen" experience for any set of web URLs: https://www.landriannetworks.com/OpsBrowser3D/

With OpsBrowser 3D I can have up to 9 instances of HeatMap.TV on the screen in the lobby revolving around and animated in 3D!

Why did the post get "[flagged]"???

Not sure, but since the site is back up, we can turn flags off for now. If any of the users who flagged the post had a different reason, it might be helpful to let us know at hn@ycombinator.com.

Are you running Adsense ads on the FAQ page?

removed

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