Configuration for User Monitoring and Replay

⚙️ Configure User Monitoring & Session Replay

📖 Overview

GermainUX User Monitoring & Session Replay can be configured globally or for individual UX Monitoring Profiles.

Configuration controls:

Configuration depends on the RUM component used:

For application-specific configuration, first check the applicable GermainUX Integration guide.

💡 Before You Begin

Before configuring User Monitoring & Session Replay:

1. Deploy the appropriate RUM component.

2. Verify that monitoring data is reaching GermainUX.

3. Identify the applications and users to monitor.

4. Review your organization's privacy, security, consent, and data-retention requirements.

5. Check whether a dedicated GermainUX Integration guide exists for the monitored application.

🔗 Use the Integration Guide When Available

Many applications and technologies have dedicated GermainUX Integration guides.

These guides can include application-specific configuration for:

When an Integration guide is available, follow its application-specific configuration instructions in addition to the general settings described on this page.

View GermainUX Integrations

🔑 Access UX Monitoring Profiles

Most application-specific User Monitoring settings are configured through:

Germain Workspace -> Settings -> Analytics -> UX Monitoring Profiles

Select the UX Monitoring Profile for the application or user population you want to configure.

Global User Monitoring and Session Replay settings are available under:

Germain Workspace -> Settings -> System -> UX and Session Replay Settings

Global settings apply across applicable UX Monitoring Profiles.

🎥 Session Replay Configuration

🟢 Enable or Disable Session Replay for a Profile

Session Replay is enabled by default for each UX Monitoring Profile.

To change this setting:

1. Go to Germain Workspace -> Settings -> Analytics -> UX Monitoring Profiles.

2. Select the profile.

3. Enable or disable Session Replay Monitoring.

4. Click Save.

This setting affects only the selected UX Monitoring Profile.

⛔ Disable Session Replay Globally

To stop collecting Session Replay data across all profiles:

1. Go to Germain Workspace -> Settings -> System -> UX and Session Replay Settings.

2. Disable Session Replay Data.

3. Click Save.

The global setting takes precedence over individual UX Monitoring Profile settings.

⏰ Configure Session Timeout

By default, an ongoing session times out when GermainUX receives no new event for one hour.

The session is then marked Timed Out and closed. The next event starts a new session.

To change the timeout:

1. Go to Germain Workspace -> Settings -> System -> UX and Session Replay Settings.

2. Locate the Session Replay section.

3. Update Session Timeout, in minutes.

4. Click Save.
   

   

⏱️ Recording Configuration

📏 Configure Maximum Recording Duration

By default, GermainUX does not impose a maximum Session Replay recording duration.

For applicable RUM configurations, use:

settings.constants.maxSessionDurationMillis

For example, to limit a recording to one hour:

settings.constants.maxSessionDurationMillis = 3_600_000; // One hour

The value is specified in milliseconds.

🔁 Start a New Session When the Username Changes

Use:

settings.constants.createNewSessionIfUsernameChanges

to control how GermainUX handles multiple user logins from the same monitored browser or desktop.

Add the appropriate setting to the applicable monitoring configuration.

Use separate sessions when a shared browser or desktop can be used by multiple authenticated users and their activity should remain distinct.

▶️ Session Replay Player Configuration

👥 Configure Events & Transactions

The Session Replay player displays correlated events and transactions alongside the recording.

By default, it includes every KPI configured as a child of the User Session Replay KPI.

To control which KPIs appear:

1. Go to Germain Workspace -> Settings -> Analytics -> KPIs.

2. Select User Session Replay.

3. Update Child KPIs.

4. Click Save.
   

   

This allows Session Replay to correlate the user's visual experience with relevant business, application, and technology events.

Examples can include:

📈 Configure User Activity Periods

Orange bars at the top of the Session Replay player identify periods of user activity.

Each period represents a sequence of user events within the monitored application.

To configure which event types contribute to activity periods:

1. Go to Germain Workspace -> Settings -> System -> UX and Session Replay Settings.

2. Locate the Session Replay section.

3. Update User Activity.

4. Click Save.

This setting applies to all applicable UX Monitoring Profiles.

🖱️ User Interaction Monitoring

Configure Dead, Error & Rage Click Monitoring

GermainUX can identify:

These signals can help identify unresponsive controls, application failures, and UX friction.

See Configure Dead, Error & Rage Click Monitoring for detailed configuration.

🔒 Data Privacy & Exclusions

GermainUX provides controls over the user and application data captured by User Monitoring & Session Replay.

Depending on your organization's requirements, data can be:

Configure privacy controls before broad production deployment.

See the applicable Data Privacy Configuration documentation for detailed masking, exclusion, and privacy settings.

🤖 Exclude Bots & Crawlers

Bots and crawlers can be excluded from User Monitoring & Session Replay to prevent automated activity from affecting UX analytics or consuming unnecessary storage.

Default exclusions include:

Default bot and crawler exclusions can be enabled during initial RUM JS deployment using the Bot/Crawler Agent Exclusion option.

To update exclusions for an existing profile:

1. Go to Germain Workspace -> Settings -> Analytics -> UX Monitoring Profiles.

2. Select the profile.

3. Update Excluded User Agents.

4. Click Save.
   

   

🌍 Include or Exclude IP Addresses

IP ranges can control which clients are eligible for User Monitoring.

Included ranges take precedence over excluded ranges.

Both lists are empty by default. An empty Included IP Ranges list means all IP addresses are eligible for monitoring.

To configure IP filtering:

1. Go to Germain Workspace -> Settings -> Analytics -> UX Monitoring Profiles.

2. Select the profile.

3. Add or modify Excluded IP Ranges or Included IP Ranges.

4. Click Save.

IP filtering can be useful for excluding:

👤 Exclude Usernames

Specific users can be excluded from monitoring.

Typical examples include:

The monitoring component must first identify the username. If the extracted username matches an entry in Excluded Usernames, GermainUX stops collecting monitoring data for that user.

To configure excluded users:

1. Go to Germain Workspace -> Settings -> Analytics -> UX Monitoring Profiles.

2. Select the profile.

3. Update Excluded Usernames.

4. Click Save.
   

   

👻 Exclude Headless Browsers

Headless browsers can be excluded to prevent automated or synthetic scenarios from being recorded as real-user activity.

To configure this setting:

1. Go to Germain Workspace -> Left Menu → Settings -> Analytics -> UX Monitoring Profiles.

2. Select the profile.

3. Enable or disable Exclude Headless Browsers.

4. Click Save.
   

   

🚀 Advanced Configuration

🔍 Phrases of Interest

Phrases of Interest allow GermainUX to detect specified text or regular expressions displayed in a monitored application.

When a match occurs, GermainUX creates a record under the Phrase of Interest Appeared KPI and identifies the event in the recorded session.

Phrases of Interest can identify events such as:

✨ Add a Phrase from Session Replay

To create a Phrase of Interest directly from a recorded session:

1. Open Session Replay.

2. Highlight the text to monitor.

3. Right-click the selected text.

4. Select Add text to Phrases-of-Interest.

   

5. Review the new entry under Analytics -> UX Monitoring Profiles -> [Profile].

The phrase is monitored in subsequent sessions associated with the profile.

🔤 Use a Regular Expression

Regular expressions can be used when the text being monitored varies.

To configure one:

1. Go to Analytics -> UX Monitoring Profiles -> [Profile] -> [Phrase of Interest].
   

   

2. Enable Regex.

   

3. Enter the regular expression.

4. Click Save.
   

For example, the following expression can detect discounts from 60% through 99%:

\([6-9][0-9]%\sOFF\)

🔔 Create a Watch from a Phrase of Interest

A Watch can notify users when a Phrase of Interest appears.

From Session Replay, select Add Watch on this Phrase-of-Interest.

A Watch can be configured to notify:

This allows an observed user experience to become a continuously monitored condition.

🛠️ Advanced Session Replay Customization

✨ Add a Custom Insight or Timeline Event

Custom Insights can add organization-specific events to the Session Replay player.

For example, an eCommerce organization can add an Add to Cart timeline event that identifies every product-addition event during the session.

To configure a custom timeline event:

1. Go to Germain Workspace -> Settings -> System -> System Settings -> UI Config.

2. Navigate to:

   Analysis Dashboards -> User Session Replay -> portlets -> Replay of User Session -> timelineEvents
   

   

3. Click Add.

4. Configure the timeline event.

5. Click Create.
   

   

📑 Configuration Reference

📄 eventModel Example

{
  "label": "Add to Cart",
  "tooltip": "Product added",
  "color": "black",
  "height": 10,
  "icon": "fa-solid fa-cart-shopping",
  "zIndex": 1,
  "timelinePosition": "above"
}

After the configuration is saved, the custom insight becomes available across applicable recorded sessions and the configured marker appears on the timeline whenever a matching event occurs.

✅ Validate the Configuration

After changing User Monitoring or Session Replay configuration:

1. Start a controlled test session.

2. Perform representative user actions.

3. Confirm that the session reaches GermainUX.

4. Open the Session Replay.

5. Verify that expected user activity is captured.

6. Verify the Events & Transactions stream.

7. Confirm configured activity periods.

8. Verify applicable Dead, Error, and Rage Click detection.

9. Verify Phrases of Interest when configured.

10. Confirm custom timeline events when configured.

11. Verify that excluded users, IP addresses, bots, and headless browsers are handled correctly.

12. Confirm that privacy, masking, and exclusion rules are applied as expected.
    

    

🛡️ Security & Privacy

User Monitoring & Session Replay can capture detailed information about user interactions with monitored applications.

Before production deployment:

📖 Related Documentation

ℹ️ Get Help

The Germain Team can help you set this up. Contact GermainUX Support.