Clarification on classification usage

[nitesh__anwani]

Hi Folks,

Problem statement: Currently on my company website, we have the page name getting captured as the page URL itself, or in some cases, we are passing the custom page name value. In both cases, we have a value of more than 100 characters and in some cases, more than 255 characters.

The solution in evaluation: rather than passing that much long value from a website, I plan to pass a unique id for each page as a page name, and then use the classifications in adobe analytics to have an additional detail like page name.

As I am working on the classification rule for the first time, I have a few points to confirm:

1. do we have any character limitations concerning the values we import in classification?

2. is my approach correct for the problem in hand?

Thanks,

Nitesh

[MandyGeorge · Accepted solution]

Hi @nitesh__anwani, for classifications, yes there are still character limits. From this page https://experienceleague.adobe.com/docs/analytics/components/classifications/classifications-importe... 

• Character limits are enforced to classify report data. For example, if you upload a classifications text file for products ( s.products) with product names longer than 100 characters (bytes), the products will not display in reporting. Tracking Codes and all custom conversion variables (eVars) allow 255 bytes.

That reference page should have a lot of useful information for you about the limitations of classifications.

In terms of is this approach correct, based on the information you described (having a page ID and uploading a classification of correlated page names), it sounds like you will be using the classification rule builder. One of the drawbacks of this is that it will only classify the values that you upload, so whenever you add new pages to your site, you will need to update the classification. 

[leocwlau]

First I will ask do you really need such a long page name as 255 characters are quite a long string already, and it is very difficult to read in Workspace projects.

As your page name comes from URL, you can look at the URL structure to see if there is anything that can be omitted or shortened. Using the URL of this thread as an example: https://experienceleaguecommunities.adobe.com/t5/adobe-analytics-questions/clarification-on-classifi.... The whole "https://experienceleaguecommunities.adobe.com" can be turned into "ELC", "t5" is not required, "adobe-analytics-questions" can be "AAQ", the remaining are dynamic from the question title can be turned into the code "577430" only.

As you can pass in custom page names, the above conversion can help to shorten the page name dramatically.

As mentioned by @MandyGeorge that there are still character limits on classification so it cannot help you and you also need to regularly and manually upload the classification text which is problematic. There is API to upload but which is AA API 1.4 and no corresponding API in the AA API 2.0, so not a reliable approach.

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So if such a long page name is absolutely required, I will use 2 eVar to store them. The first eVar store up to a certain level of structure, like "hostname:top_level:2nd_level", then a second eVar stores the remaining, like "3rd_level:4th_level:html_file". You will always need to break down when creating reports as the complete page name comes from 2 eVar and you need to balance well how many levels go into the first eVar as there is a limit of 255 characters.

However, the best option is still to review the page name structure to keep it short and within 255.

[nitesh__anwani]

@leocwlau @MandyGeorge  Thanks for your response.

It was constructive for me to think in the correct direction.

I plan to review how page names are designed and assigned to my website. 

As maintaining the classification for every new page is not easy, and utilizing the new eVars will also limit the additional info which we can capture in these new variables.  because I have multiple brands using the same report suite.