CustomEmailTracker

Welcome to the CustomEmailTracker gem! This gem provides email tracking functionality for Rails applications, allowing you to track when emails are opened and when links within emails are clicked. It integrates seamlessly with ActionMailer to enhance your email interactions and analytics.

Add the gem to your application's Gemfile:

gem 'custom_email_tracker', '~> 0.1.2'

Then run:

$ bundle install

Or install it directly using:

$ gem install custom_email_tracker -v '0.1.2'

First, ensure your Rails console is running:

$ rails c

Then, create the necessary migration file for your database and update your mailer views by running:

CustomEmailTracker::MigrationCreator.create_migration_file

This method will:

• Generate a migration file to create a tracked_emails table in your database. This table will store information about tracked emails including tokens, timestamps, and other relevant details.
• Append necessary tracking code to your mailer layout file (mailer.html.erb) to insert a tracking pixel in your email views. If this file does not exist, you will need to manually add the provided content.

After running the migration creator, apply the migration to your database:

$ rails db:migrate

Add the following configurations to your environment files:

In config/environments/development.rb:

Rails.application.routes.default_url_options[:host] = 'localhost'
Rails.application.routes.default_url_options[:port] = PORT

In config/environments/production.rb:

Rails.application.routes.default_url_options[:host] = 'domain-name.com'

Replace 'domain-name.com' with your actual domain name.

1. Add Tracking Pixel to Emails:

   If your mailer layout file (mailer.html.erb) exists, the tracking code should already be appended. If it does not exist, you need to manually add the following code to your mailer views where you want to track email openings:

   <% unless @avoid_tracking %>
     <%
     new_tracked_email = TrackedEmail.track_new(message.to.first, message.delivery_handler, action_name)
     %>
     <% if new_tracked_email.present? %>
         <%= new_tracked_email[:image] %>
     <% end %>
   <% end %>

2. Handling Missing Mailer Layout File:

   If your mailer.html.erb file does not exist, you can create one in app/views/layouts/ and add the tracking code snippet mentioned above.

After checking out the repo, run bin/setup to install dependencies. Then, run rake spec to run the tests. You can also run bin/console for an interactive prompt that will allow you to experiment.

To install this gem onto your local machine, run:

$ bundle exec rake install

To release a new version, update the version number in lib/custom_email_tracker/version.rb, and then run:

$ bundle exec rake release

This will create a git tag for the version, push git commits and the created tag, and push the .gem file to rubygems.org.

Bug reports and pull requests are welcome on GitHub at https://github.com/believebhushan/email_tracker. This project is intended to be a safe, welcoming space for collaboration, and contributors are expected to adhere to the code of conduct.

The gem is available as open source under the terms of the MIT License.

Everyone interacting in the CustomEmailTracker project's codebases, issue trackers, chat rooms, and mailing lists is expected to follow the code of conduct.

The track_new method is designed to manage the tracking of email openings. Here’s how it works:

1. Creating or Finding a Tracked Email: The method looks for an existing TrackedEmail record with the provided token. If the token is present and a record with this token is found, it returns the tracking pixel and status indicating that the record already exists.

2. Creating a New Tracked Email: If no record with the given token is found, a new TrackedEmail record is created with the provided email address, mailer class, and action. The tracking pixel is generated and returned.

3. Handling Missing Tokens: If no token is provided, a new TrackedEmail is created with the provided email and action details, and a tracking pixel is returned.

The generate_tracking_pixel method is used to generate an invisible tracking pixel embedded in the email body. The pixel's URL includes the unique token, allowing the application to track when the email is opened.

Feel free to adjust the content as needed!