Feat: New analytics using GA4 [DEV] by criticalAY · Pull Request #20582 · ankidroid/Anki-Android

criticalAY · 2026-03-25T15:49:44Z

Community & Privacy Context

Before diving into the technical details, we want to be completely transparent about what this PR does and does not do. We have had analytics in the app for years to help us understand feature usage, but the system recently broke. This PR is strictly a bugfix to restore that existing functionality.

Because community trust is our top priority, please note:

It is strictly opt-in: Absolutely no data is collected unless a user explicitly consents.
It is privacy-preserving: We do not collect personal data. We only use simple counters to track feature usage, which tells us what the community needs us to focus on.
It is transparent: We are open to sharing our aggregated analytics with the world in the future if the platform allows for it.
Team Aligned: This update has been thoroughly discussed and has the full backing of the core maintainers.

Technical Implementation

I am updating the analytics usage in project, I forked library that Mike had implemented and after going through it, I create my own library with Kt and implemented whatever was there in java one(help needed here as the library needs more test which I am adding but any help is welcome).

Steps implemented:

Wrote a new analytics class with decoupled logic.
Secured and hid the API key in Gradle.
Updated all analytics usage across the project and deleted the deprecated legacy code.
Library Link: https://github.com/criticalAY/google-analytics-kt

Fixes

Approach

NA, the commits are faily self explaining

How Has This Been Tested?

Pixel 10

Learning (optional, can help others)

A lot of it tbh, the migration in Kotlin took me almost 2 days, then how to publish the library on maven (I had published the library on jitpack before but never on maven so this was new, Mike can give me valuable input since he is maintaining a lot fo things)

Checklist

Please, go through these checks before submitting the PR.

You have a descriptive commit message with a short title (first line, max 50 chars).
You have commented your code, particularly in hard-to-understand areas
You have performed a self-review of your own code
UI changes: include screenshots of all affected screens (in particular showing any new or changed strings)
UI Changes: You have tested your change using the Google Accessibility Scanner

criticalAY · 2026-03-25T15:50:37Z

TODO for me: Update the analytics usage in the whole app i.e. find the places where it is not there as of now and fix it

david-allison

This is AWESOME

Before we look into this further, we need commits to:

Remove all past consent for analytics, and use another preference key
Modify our consent dialog to be opt-in, not opt-out (flip a checkbox default state)

EDIT: Split the refactorings out into 'move' commits whenever you can. so we don't lose git history

BrayanDSO

IMO, #20584 and #20585 should be part of this PR. The third commit duplicates a lot of stuff which only makes sense when the old code is removed.

BrayanDSO

meant to request changes

criticalAY · 2026-04-04T15:22:56Z

IMO, #20584 and #20585 should be part of this PR. The third commit duplicates a lot of stuff which only makes sense when the old code is removed.

The commit was originally part of this PR but it was getting bit messy so wanted to make review easier, I think it's fine(want to save time)

criticalAY · 2026-04-09T08:31:40Z

@david-allison what's blocking here now?

BrayanDSO

Great work. Getting analytics back is going to be amazing. Thanks!

david-allison

Sorry to nitpick. From what I see in the diff, this no longer matches the description

The issue should not be closed
This functionality is not enabled
The old implementation is not removed

david-allison · 2026-04-28T14:23:50Z

+     * analytics client id. Keeping it isolated avoids exposing the id through
+     * preference screens, backups, or bulk prefs operations on the main file.
+     */
+    private const val ANALYTICS_PREFS = "analyticsPrefs"


How would this be impacted by profiles?

david-allison · 2026-04-28T14:24:56Z

+    @Volatile private var optIn = false
+
+    private val serviceScope = CoroutineScope(Dispatchers.IO + SupervisorJob())
+    private val clientId: String by lazy { getOrCreateClientId(AnkiDroidApp.instance) }


Note that we have rare Android-level bugs where AnkiDroidApp.instance is not defined.

This needs to be handled: analytics is a startup concern which must not crash

david-allison · 2026-04-28T14:26:28Z

+                    apiSecret = BuildConfig.ANALYTICS_API_KEY
+                    appName = appContext.getString(R.string.app_name)
+                    appVersion = BuildConfig.VERSION_NAME
+                    enabled = true


Why does this not use optIn?

david-allison · 2026-04-28T14:26:50Z

+
+        serviceScope.launch {
+            runCatching { analytics?.flush() }.onFailure { e ->
+                Timber.e(e, "Failed to flush analytics")


Suggested change

Timber.e(e, "Failed to flush analytics")

Timber.w(e, "Failed to flush analytics")

david-allison · 2026-04-28T14:28:11Z

+    private fun getRootCause(t: Throwable): Throwable {
+        var result = t
+        while (result.cause != null && result.cause !== result) {
+            result = result.cause!!
+        }
+        return result
+    }


I would make this an extension method and move it to common

Throwable.getRootCause

david-allison · 2026-04-28T14:31:17Z

+    var isEnabled: Boolean
+        get() = optIn
+        set(value) {
+            AnkiDroidApp.instance.sharedPrefs().edit {
+                putBoolean(ANALYTICS_OPTIN_KEY, value)
+            }
+        }


this doesn't set optIn

david-allison · 2026-04-28T14:32:14Z

+        val analytics = analytics ?: return
+        analytics
+            .exception(clientId)
+            .description(description.take(150))


Explain why 150

david-allison · 2026-04-28T14:33:05Z

+        }
+    }
+
+    fun sendAnalyticsScreenView(screen: Any) = sendAnalyticsScreenView(screen.javaClass.simpleName)


document usage and what this outputs: com.ichi2.anki.DeckPicker or DeckPicker

david-allison · 2026-04-28T14:33:19Z

 desugar-jdk-libs-nio = "2.1.5"
 drawer = "1.0.3"
 espresso = '3.7.0'
+googleAnalyticsKt = "1.2.1"


Add a comment linking the GitHub repo

david-allison · 2026-04-28T14:34:21Z

+        return samplePercentage
+    }
+
+    private fun initializePrefKeys(context: Context) {


Quickly document what this does

github-actions Bot added the Needs Review label Mar 25, 2026

criticalAY mentioned this pull request Mar 25, 2026

Update the analytics usage #20583

Open

david-allison reviewed Mar 25, 2026

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criticalAY force-pushed the feat/analytics-ga4 branch 5 times, most recently from 6764e26 to 360b343 Compare March 25, 2026 17:18

criticalAY mentioned this pull request Mar 25, 2026

Refactor: use new analytics usage #20584

Open

5 tasks

BrayanDSO approved these changes Mar 29, 2026

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Comment thread AnkiDroid/src/main/java/com/ichi2/anki/analytics/AnalyticsConstants.kt

BrayanDSO requested changes Mar 29, 2026

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BrayanDSO added Needs Author Reply Waiting for a reply from the original author and removed Needs Review labels Mar 29, 2026

criticalAY force-pushed the feat/analytics-ga4 branch from 360b343 to bb640a0 Compare April 4, 2026 15:21

criticalAY added Needs Review and removed Needs Author Reply Waiting for a reply from the original author labels Apr 4, 2026

BrayanDSO reviewed Apr 5, 2026

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Comment thread AnkiDroid/src/main/java/com/ichi2/anki/analytics/AnalyticsConstants.kt

criticalAY mentioned this pull request Apr 8, 2026

refactor: extract analytics constants #20685

Merged

5 tasks

criticalAY added the Analytics label Apr 8, 2026

github-actions Bot added the Has Conflicts label Apr 8, 2026

criticalAY force-pushed the feat/analytics-ga4 branch from bb640a0 to d97afae Compare April 8, 2026 11:51

criticalAY removed the Has Conflicts label Apr 8, 2026

criticalAY changed the title ~~Feat: New analytics using GA4~~ Feat: New analytics using GA4 [DEV] Apr 9, 2026

BrayanDSO reviewed Apr 23, 2026

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criticalAY force-pushed the feat/analytics-ga4 branch from d97afae to 32db738 Compare April 28, 2026 13:18

BrayanDSO approved these changes Apr 28, 2026

View reviewed changes

BrayanDSO removed the Needs Review label Apr 28, 2026

BrayanDSO added the Needs Second Approval Has one approval, one more approval to merge label Apr 28, 2026

david-allison requested changes Apr 28, 2026

View reviewed changes

criticalAY added 2 commits May 2, 2026 11:19

feat: add dependency for analytics

6fe8bd4

feat: add GA4 API key to build.gradle file

7bd12c5

criticalAY force-pushed the feat/analytics-ga4 branch from 32db738 to 59e60b1 Compare May 2, 2026 05:57

feat: implementation for new GA4 library

76fb29e

criticalAY force-pushed the feat/analytics-ga4 branch from 59e60b1 to 76fb29e Compare May 2, 2026 06:01

criticalAY requested a review from david-allison May 2, 2026 06:01

	Timber.e(e, "Failed to flush analytics")
	Timber.w(e, "Failed to flush analytics")

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Community & Privacy Context

Because community trust is our top priority, please note:

Technical Implementation

Fixes

Approach

How Has This Been Tested?

Learning (optional, can help others)

Checklist

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criticalAY commented Apr 4, 2026

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