About UserALE

Note: Work on UserALE’s documentation is ongoing. To get involved, see our Contributing guide. To get started with UserALE, try out the full Flagon stack.

About UserALE

The User Analytic Logging Engine (UserALE) is part of Apache Flagon. UserALE is for Software Developers, HCI/UX researchers, and project managers who develop user facing software tools—applications that are used for manipulating, analyzing, or visualizing data or other systems.

UserALE provides an API for instrumenting software tools, turning them into a human usability sensors. With every user interaction User ALE will transmit specially structured messages (JSON) from software tools to an activity logging server (Elasticsearch™). These messages not only report user activities and their timing, but provide sufficient context to understand how those activities are related to the functional organization of the software tool. This allows for greater utility in understanding how users are interacting with software tool features, and seeds more rigorous modeling and analytic approaches to understand not just what users do in software tools, but how they perform tasks with them.

UserALE provides data provides insight into software tool usage frequency, users’ cognitive/behavioral strategy in using tools to complete tasks, their workflows, as well as their integrative use of software tool features.

Who is UserALE for?

UserALE is for Software Developers, HCI/UX researchers, and project managers who develop user facing software tools.