The tap-google-analytics Meltano extractor pulls data from Google Analytics that can then be sent to a destination using a loader.

Alternative variants #

Multiple variants of tap-google-analytics are available. This document describes the default meltanolabs variant, which is recommended for new users.

Alternative variants are:

Getting Started #

Prerequisites #

If you haven't already, follow the initial steps of the Getting Started guide:

  1. Install Meltano
  2. Create your Meltano project

Installation and configuration #

  1. Add the tap-google-analytics extractor to your project using meltano add : 

    meltano add extractor tap-google-analytics
  2. Configure the settings below using meltano config .

Next steps #

Follow the remaining steps of the Getting Started guide:

  1. Select entities and attributes to extract
  2. Add a loader to send data to a destination
  3. Run a data integration (EL) pipeline
If you run into any issues, learn how to get help.

Capabilities #

Settings #

tap-google-analytics requires the configuration of one of the following groups of settings:

The settings for extractor tap-google-analytics that are known to Meltano are documented below. To quickly find the setting you're looking for, use the Table of Contents at the top of the page.

Client Secrets File Location (key_file_location) #

  • Environment variable: TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_KEY_FILE_LOCATION
  • Default: $MELTANO_PROJECT_ROOT/client_secrets.json

How to get #

Follow the steps below if you don’t already have a valid client_secrets.json to upload. The process below can take over 10 minutes, but it’s a one-time setup that’s well worth it.

This extractor supports service account based authorization, where an administrator manually creates a service account with the appropriate permissions to view the account, property, and view you wish to fetch data from.

To access your Google Analytics data, the “Analytics Reporting API” and “Analytics API” both need to be enabled. These need to be enabled for a project inside the same organization as your Google Analytics account.

Step 1: Creating Service Account Credentials #

As a first step, you need to create a new project in Google Cloud Platform or use an existing one:

  1. Sign in to the Google Account you are using for managing Google Analytics (you must have Manage Users permission at the account, property, or view level).

  2. Open the Service accounts page. If prompted, select a project or create a new one to use for accessing Google Analytics.

Screenshot of Google Service Accounts page

  1. Click “Create service account”

In the Create service account window, type a name for the service account, and click Create.

We do not need to provide any additional permissions for this account, so click Continue in the Service account permissions configuration page.

We also do not need to grant access to any users for this service account, as we only need the key.

Screenshot of Google Service Account Configuration for new Account

Click Create Key, select JSON as the key type and create a new private key. Then click Save and store it locally as client_secrets.json.

Meltano will use the private key in this client_secrets.json file to connect with the Google Analytics API.

Step 2: Linking Credentials to Google Analytics #

The newly created service account will have an email address that looks similar to:

service-account-name@PROJECT-ID.iam.gserviceaccount.com

To grant this service account access to your Google Analytics data, add the email address as a new user to your Google Analytics account, property or view through the “Admin > User Management” page.

Only the Read & Analyze permissions are needed as Meltano only extracts data to generate reports.

Screenshot of Google Analytics Add User

Step 3: Enabling the APIs #
  1. Visit the Google Analytics Reporting API dashboard and make sure that the project you used in the previous step is selected.

Now enable the API using the button at the top, so that the button will say “Disable API” instead:

Screenshot of Google Analytics Reporting API

  1. Next, visit the Google Analytics API dashboard, make sure that the project you used in the previous step is selected, and enable this API as well.

Screenshot of Google Analytics API

How to use #

Manage this setting using meltano config or an environment variable: 

meltano config tap-google-analytics set key_file_location <key_file_location>

export TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_KEY_FILE_LOCATION=<key_file_location>

Client Secrets JSON (client_secrets) #

Follow the above steps for Key File Location but instead of providing a path you can provide the serialized json directly. This can be useful for ephemeral runtime environments where its easier to provide an environment variable instead of a file.

How to use #

Manage this setting using meltano config or an environment variable: 

meltano config tap-google-analytics set client_secrets '{...}'

export TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_CLIENT_SECRETS='{...}'

OAuth Client ID (oauth_credentials.client_id) #

See https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/reporting/core/v4/authorization#OAuth2Authorizing.

Takes precedence over Key File Location if both are specified.

How to use #

Manage this setting using meltano config or an environment variable: 

meltano config tap-google-analytics set oauth_credentials.client_id <oauth_credentials.client_id>

export TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_OAUTH_CREDENTIALS_CLIENT_ID=<oauth_credentials.client_id>

OAuth Client Secret (oauth_credentials.client_secret) #

See https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/reporting/core/v4/authorization#OAuth2Authorizing.

How to use #

Manage this setting using meltano config or an environment variable: 

meltano config tap-google-analytics set oauth_credentials.client_secret <oauth_credentials.client_secret>

export TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_OAUTH_CREDENTIALS_CLIENT_SECRET=<oauth_credentials.client_secret>

OAuth Access Token (oauth_credentials.access_token) #

See https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/reporting/core/v4/authorization#OAuth2Authorizing.

How to use #

Manage this setting using meltano config or an environment variable: 

meltano config tap-google-analytics set oauth_credentials.access_token <oauth_credentials.access_token>

export TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_OAUTH_CREDENTIALS_ACCESS_TOKEN=<oauth_credentials.access_token>

OAuth Refresh Token (oauth_credentials.refresh_token) #

See https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/reporting/core/v4/authorization#OAuth2Authorizing.

How to use #

Manage this setting using meltano config or an environment variable: 

meltano config tap-google-analytics set oauth_credentials.refresh_token <oauth_credentials.refresh_token>

export TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_OAUTH_CREDENTIALS_REFRESH_TOKEN=<oauth_credentials.refresh_token>

View ID (view_id) #

The ID for the view to fetch data from.

How to get #

To get your View ID:

  1. Visit Google Analytics: https://analytics.google.com/
  2. Log in if you haven’t already.
  3. Open the account/property/view selector in the top left corner

Screenshot of closed account selector

  1. Select the account, property, and view that you would like to connect with Meltano

Screenshot of open account selector

  1. You will see the View ID displayed inside the selector below the name of the view (e.g. “All Web Site Data”): 188274549

How to use #

Manage this setting using meltano config or an environment variable: 

meltano config tap-google-analytics set view_id <view_id>

export TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_VIEW_ID=<view_id>

Reports (reports) #

Project-relative path to JSON file with the definition of the reports to be generated.

See https://ga-dev-tools.appspot.com/dimensions-metrics-explorer/ for valid dimensions and metrics.

The JSON structure expected is as follows:

[
  { "name" : "name of stream to be used",
    "dimensions" :
    [
      "Google Analytics Dimension",
      "Another Google Analytics Dimension",
      // ... up to 7 dimensions per stream ...
    ],
    "metrics" :
    [
      "Google Analytics Metric",
      "Another Google Analytics Metric",
      // ... up to 10 metrics per stream ...
    ]
  },
  // ... as many streams / reports as the user wants ...
]

For example, if you want to extract user stats per day in a users_per_day stream and session stats per day and country in a sessions_per_country_day stream:

[
  { "name" : "users_per_day",
    "dimensions" :
    [
      "ga:date"
    ],
    "metrics" :
    [
      "ga:users",
      "ga:newUsers"
    ]
  },
  { "name" : "sessions_per_country_day",
    "dimensions" :
    [
      "ga:date",
      "ga:country"
    ],
    "metrics" :
    [
      "ga:sessions",
      "ga:sessionsPerUser",
      "ga:avgSessionDuration"
    ]
  }
]

How to use #

Manage this setting using meltano config or an environment variable: 

meltano config tap-google-analytics set reports <reports>

export TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_REPORTS=<reports>

Start Date (start_date) #

This property determines how much historical data will be extracted. Please be aware that the larger the time period and amount of data, the longer the initial extraction can be expected to take.

How to use #

Manage this setting using meltano config or an environment variable: 

meltano config tap-google-analytics set start_date YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SSZ

export TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_START_DATE=YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SSZ

End Date (end_date) #

Date up to when historical data will be extracted.

How to use #

Manage this setting using meltano config or an environment variable: 

meltano config tap-google-analytics set end_date YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SSZ

export TAP_GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_END_DATE=YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SSZ

Looking for help? #

If you're having trouble getting the tap-google-analytics extractor to work, look for an existing issue in its repository, file a new issue, or join the Meltano Slack community and ask for help in the #plugins-general channel.

Found an issue on this page? #

This page is generated from a YAML file that you can contribute changes to. Edit it on GitHub!