Designing an unobtrusive analytics framework for monitoring java applications sampo suonsyrjä

Designing an Unobtrusive
Analytics Framework
for Monitoring Java Applications
Sampo Suonsyrjä and Tommi Mikkonen
Dept. of Pervasive Computing
Tampere University of Technology

Contents
•  Context
–  Paradigm change in
software development
–  Web apps vs. installable
programs
•  Motivation
–  Why the
unobtrusiveness?
•  Case
–  Vaadin framework as the
platform of a target program
–  The designed analytics
framework
•  Discussion
•  Conclusions
17.10.15 2

Paradigm Change in Software Development
•  Waterfall method and such
–  User involvement only before
development
–  Requirements defined before
any use
–  Systems remained the same
throughout their life
–  Changes in user
requirements? No more use!
Throw the cd away
•  Agile methods
–  Requirements defined as late
as possible
–  Users involved iteratively
–  More knowledge of what is
possible and needed
–  Developing less, but with a
greater accuracy
–  Changes in user requirements?
Order an extension to the sw.
dev. project
17.10.15 3

Paradigm Change and the First Frontier
•  Feedback with agile methods
–  User surveys, thinking aloud,
observations
–  Manually collected
qualitative data
–  Stops when development
stops
•  Continuous Delivery &
Deployment systems
–  New versions are delivered
faster than ever
–  Developing experiments, not
just reacting to requirements
–  Usage Data = results from
these experiments
–  Automatic collecting needed
•  Web as a platform for analytics
–  Channel is clear
–  Tools are available
–  A/B testing is easier than ever
–  Continuous experimentation
17.10.15 4

Why the Unobtrusiveness?
•  Collecting usage data leads to changes in the target program
•  Target program is continuously under change
•  Target program can be built by others
•  Data should remain
–  Collectable
–  Comparable between different versions
•  If data collecting is independent of the target..
•  ..then data collecting mechanism could be reused
17.10.15 5

Vaadin Framework
•  Open source framework
for developing Rich
Internet Applications
•  Applications are written
in Java..
•  ..and then transformed
into AJAX applications
17.10.15 6

Target Program
•  Demo app of the Vaadin
Framework
•  QuickTickets Dashboard
Demo
•  Source code available
•  Built by someone else
than the researchers
17.10.15 7

Target Program
public DashboardView() {
HorizontalLayout top = new HorizontalLayout();
addComponent(top);
Button notify = new Button('2');
Notify.addClickListener(
new ClickListener(){
...
});
top.addComponent(notify);
};
17.10.15 8

The Designed Framework for
Unobtrusive Analytics
•  AspectJ for usage
monitoring
•  Fluentd for collecting
•  ElasticSearch for storing
•  Kibana for visualizing
17.10.15 9

AspectJ
public aspect AddComponentListener {
pointcut addComponentCall(Button b):
call(* *.addComponent(*))&& args(b);
after(final Button b):addComponentCall(b)
{
b.addClickListener(
new Button.ClickListener()
{ public void
click(ClickEvent e) {
dataCollector.logEvent(b, e);
}
});
}}
public DashboardView() {
HorizontalLayout top = new
HorizontalLayout();
addComponent(top);
Button notify = new Button('2');
Notify.addClickListener(
new ClickListener(){
...
});
top.addComponent(notify);
};
17.10.15 10

AspectJ
•  Aspect-oriented programming is unobtrusive by
nature
•  No alteration of the original source code
•  Tooling is affected however
–  AspectJ dependency inserted
–  Aspect class file inserted
–  Normal compiling + aspect weaving
17.10.15 11

Fluentd
•  Implemented similarly as
aspects
–  Fluentd dependency added
–  A logging class added
•  Parses data into JSON
•  Sends data for storing
•  In this case, Fluentd was
installed and run on the same
machine as the target
program
17.10.15 12

Fluentd
public class DataLogger {
private static FluentLogger LOG =
FluentLogger.getLogger("button.click");
public void logButtonClick(Button b, ClickEvent event){
Map<String, Object> data = new HashMap<String, Object>();
data.put("Button Caption", b.getCaption());
data.put("Button ID", b.getId());
...
LOG.log("click", data);
}}
17.10.15 13

ElasticSearch and Kibana
•  ElasticSearch is document
oriented
•  Data was already in JSON
àName fields automatically
•  Real-time access with Kibana
•  Different visualizations readily
available
17.10.15 14

Discussion
•  RQ1: To what extent can a data collecting feature be
implemented without compromising the evolution of the target
program?
•  Usage monitoring inserted without changing the source code
•  Aspect and logging class files and dependencies inserted
•  Target application’s evolution was not compromised
–  No additional effort needed if new version has different buttons
–  However, if the new version introduces new ways of implementing
buttons aspects need changing as well
17.10.15 15

Discussion
•  RQ2: What types of data can be collected with the given
approach?
•  Aspect-oriented monitoring is flexible
–  Pointcuts could be made on a vast variety of different points
–  Advices can include almost arbitrary code
–  Access to the target program in source code level
•  Vaadin Framework provided an abundant platform for collecting data
•  Usage data collected in this case
•  Perhaps end-user feedback in the future?
17.10.15 16

Discussion
•  RQ3: How to connect the data collecting feature with an
analysis framework?
•  Aspect-code can be put to produce data in various formats
àUnified logging layer (Fluentd: JSON)
àPossibility to use standardized storing and visualization tools
àUseful when combining different kinds of data (access, error,
application logs etc.)
17.10.15 17

Conclusions
•  New means of getting feedback
from end-users are needed
à Analytics with usage data
•  New versions continuously
à Need for unobtrusiveness
à Aspect-oriented collecting
Thank you!
17.10.15 18

Designing an unobtrusive analytics framework for monitoring java applications sampo suonsyrjä

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