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More friendly names than eVar#, sProp#, and event#

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Level 9

5/5/10

So I realize this is a pretty far out-there idea, but hey, that's what the Idea Exchange is all about right?  Not just finding bugs and complaining...

So here's my thinking:

eVars, sProps, events => What do these even mean to developers?  Sure Omniture experts know the difference.  And Developers who have implemented them before have put up with their usage, but in reality, they are the most unfriendly variable names ever!  Why not give us the ability to name our own variables?  Imagine how cool it'd be to set:

    s.events="loginSuccess"

or

    s.customerSegment="prospect"

First of all, Developers would LOVE the improvement.  All I ever hear and see from Developers is how unfriendly the variable names are and how difficult it is to keep them straight!

Second of all, you're probably thinking how would these all be managed within the Admin Console?  Same way as they currently are!  Except instead of the next available eVar popping up after I click "Add" in the Conversion > Conversion Variables section, a blank variable name is populated, allowing me to define the actual name of the variable!  I then give it a friendly name for reporting purposes, define the allocation, expiration, Type, and Status.  Pretty sweet!

Finally, while writing this up, I thought of a way to hack this.  I could basically make all the variable definitions in my JS file.  For example:

     s.eVar1=s.customerSegment

     if(s.events) {if(s.events.indexOf("loginSuccess")>=0) {s.events="event1"}}

     etc

However, this is certainly a hack, and events would be a mess.  Is anyone out there actually doing this?  I'd love to see how it's implemented.  Also, this would have to all be re-done in ActionScript if a site is also using Flash, since the JS is not touched by ActionScript code.

Anyways, just an idea that could help ease the pain of dev's and Omniture implementers around the world (plus, as a guy who manages several different Omniture implementations, it'd be easier to keep straight what event1 does on Site A versus Site B)...

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