New Twists in Capturing the Online User Experience

When people ask me, what Tealeaf does, I usually respond that Tealeaf provides needed visibility into what's actually happening on a web site. I typically give the analogy that Tealeaf allows you to see/understand the experience of each and every user on a website as if you had a camera over the shoulder of each and every user.

• What happens when the user experience goes across multiple web sites and multiple companies?
• How can this happen?
• Is this a mashup, SOA, a train wreck or opportunity?

Let's start with a simple example:

An online retailer chooses to outsource their catalog search function. When the user hits 'Search', the search functionality is mapped via a DNS Lookup(Cname) to an outsourced service provider. The ASP (Application Service Provider) returns complete pages of HTML content. Only when the user clicks on an item is the user returned back to the online retailer's actual web site. The user of the web site is completely unaware that they have traveled between web sites and company borders. We like to say that on the Web, your competitor is only 1 click away -- however the power of making 'subroutine calls' via HTTP means that any service or service provider is even less than a click away.

In the extreme sense, this is like driving down the highway and you enter a long tunnel. No lights are in the tunnel and your car's headlights are not operating. This is clearly not a good situation. Search is an integral part of the online shopping experience -- how can I not have Tealeaf level of visibility to the search navigation and content? What happens if the external search content is misleading, broken or confusing? How would the site owner become aware of these issues and fix them?

How do you overcome this problem?

Do you go to using 'multiple cameras' -- one per company and join the data streams -- or is there a better way?

At first glance, the multiple camera story sounds good -- it's just an extension of normal tealeaf. However, this will result in data capture in multiple data centers, requires installation of hardware across multiple companies and data centers and all sorts of other management headaches.

Should people shy away from utilizing 3rd party services as part of their application flow -- I don't think that we can easily close Pandora's box here -- the potential value is too high -- this 'issue' will not easily go away.

So, is there a better way to capture the complete user experience using a single camera?

We could capture from inside the user's browser. While this would be 'one camera' -- it would also be 1 camera per user -- so this would not be too good a solution.

Why not capture using the same techniques that enabled this class of application in the first place? Many people feel that all computer science problems can be solved with an additional level of indirection -- so here goes. Instead of just using the 'DNS remap' i.e. CNAME (DNS Alias) to allow services to be located anywhere, can we setup a common access point through which all content flows? In plainer terms, can we 'proxy' the request to the search application so that all content flows past a single inspection point, i.e. 1 camera. Such a proxy would introduce minimal latency and give the needed visibility at a minimal TCO (Total Cost of Ownership).

If you have complete visibility to the Mashup/SOA application stack -- then you can deploy with confidence -- and deliver better applications faster.

-- Robert Wenig, Founder, CTO, Member of Board.

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