Preview & Live Log

This page describes the tools that show you what ABlyft does on a page and which events it sends.

Debug modeCopy Anchor Link

Debug mode writes the decisions of the snippet to the browser console. Each line starts with ABlyft #.

Turn it onCopy Anchor Link

1. Open your project and go to Settings → Project Settings.
2. In the section Debug Mode, enable Debug mode.
3. Optionally enable Restrict debug mode. Then only browsers that opened a page with ?ablyft_show_debug=true show the output. The setting is remembered for the browser session.
4. Save and wait for the publication.

What you seeCopy Anchor Link

With debug mode on, the console shows the initialization of the snippet (project, revision, storage) and then one line per decision, indented by level:

• Initiated PAGE "…": a page matched and became active
• Initiated EXPERIMENT "…", Initiated ENVIRONMENTS LOOKUP, Initiated AUDIENCES LOOKUP: the experiment is being checked
• ENVIRONMENT "…" is matching, AUDIENCES passed, Passed all exclusion groups, Exclusion group not passed
• EXPERIMENT "…" not running - User is excluded: the visitor has been excluded before and stays excluded
• Triggering BUCKETING Event: the visitor was assigned to a variation
• Applying JS, Applying VisualChanges: variation code is run
• Triggered GOAL "…": a goal fired
• General Prerequisite Rules NOT met, Tracking Prerequisite Rules NOT met, Rated as Bot- Exiting: the snippet stops or does not track

Errors in rules or in your JavaScript are shown as ERROR on … in red and are also dispatched as the browser event ablyftError, see Verify the integration.

Preview modeCopy Anchor Link

Preview mode lets you look at a variation of an experiment, even if the experiment is not running yet.

The easiest way is the Preview section on the experiment page. Select a Variation to preview and a URL to preview, and open the link Open preview directly in browser. You can also copy the Preview/Sharing URL or scan the QR code to preview on a phone. See Preview & QA.

Behind the scenes, the preview link contains the URL parameters ablyft_preview and ablyft_exclude_running, see URL parameters. The settings are kept for the browser session (in sessionStorage), so you can click through your website without repeating the parameters.

Which experiments and checks apply during a preview is described in Preview & QA. Triggered goals are not sent, but recorded locally, see below.

Check the state of preview mode in the console:

ablyft.get('data').isPreview;        // true in preview mode
ablyft.get('preview_bucketing');     // { experimentId: variationId } from the preview parameter
ablyft.get('pingedGoals');           // goals that fired in preview mode: [{ id, time, value }]

To leave preview mode, close the tab, or delete the session storage keys starting with ablyft_ (ablyft_preview_combs, ablyft_exclude_running).

QA toolCopy Anchor Link

The QA tool shows a panel on top of your website while you browse it in preview mode. It helps you check targeting and goals.

1. Open the experiment and go to the Preview section.
2. Click Open with quality assurance tool.

This opens your page with the additional parameter ablyft_qa_token=<token>. The snippet loads the tool after the page has loaded and keeps the token for the browser session.

Force a variationCopy Anchor Link

To show a specific variation to a visitor from your own code, for example in an automated test, push a forceVariation event, see ablyft.push() for the call and its limits. Forced visitors are real participants, for a quick look at a variation use preview mode.

Opt out for testersCopy Anchor Link

To keep your own visits out of the data, open your website once with ?ablyft_opt_out=true. See Opt out.

Live LogCopy Anchor Link

The Live Log (Project → Activity Log → Live Log) shows the latest events that ABlyft received from the snippets of your project. Columns, filters and how to read them are described in Check events in the Live Log.

Next stepsCopy Anchor Link

• Verify the integration
• Common issues
• URL parameters