Filtering Rules allow you to control and refine the data that is recorded in your database by strategically blocking specific events or session data from being stored. This feature is crucial for optimizing your data management and allowing only relevant data. This helps you maintain a cleaner database and potentially improve server performance.

With Filtering Rules, you can define precise criteria to block data based on various parameters such as IP address, browser, or event type. This feature ensures that unnecessary or irrelevant data does not enter your database, thereby helping you maintain a more efficient and organized data repository.

Filtering Rules will use some server resources to achieve the desired operation. You can read more about this below.

Benefits

Filtering Rules improve your data quality by allowing you to exclude irrelevant or unnecessary entries. This helps maintain a focused and manageable dataset, which supports better decision-making and analysis. Additionally, by reducing the volume of data processed and stored, you can alleviate server load and improve overall system performance. 

Getting Started

The Filtering Rules feature is enabled by default in Countly Enterprise, and you can find it in the Main Menu > Utilities > Filtering Rules. If you still don’t see it, go to the Sidebar > Management > Feature Management and enable the Filtering Rules toggle.

Filtering Rules Overview

Using Filtering Rules

The Filtering Rules feature View has the following details:

1. Filtering Rules list - Each filtering rule in the list can be quickly activated or deactivated using its respective toggle button.
2. Table controls - Use them to change the columns shown in the table or to search for particular surveys.
3. Filtering Rules menu - You can edit filtering rules as per your needs or delete old ones.
4. + Create New Filtering Rule button - Opens the drawer to create a new filtering rule.

Creating a Filtering Rule

Upon clicking the + Create New Filtering Rule button in the main Filtering Rules View, a creation drawer will appear.

Creating a filtering rule in Countly is an easy process:

1. Choose Filtering Rules For - Choose whether you would like to filter all requests, request based on session, or request based on events.
2. Choose Targeting - You can either block all requests or add a filter.
3. Add filtering to define more accurate blocking - You can add filters such as IP Address, hostname, etc. The more filters you use, the more granular and deeper your data will be. You can keep adding properties by using the + Add Property button

In addition to this if you had selected filtering rules for events, you will need to select your event settings.

• Select from existing events - Choose from the dropdown the event you would like to block.
• Enter event string - Enter a string to match the event key you want to block in the input field.

Server Impact and Performance Considerations

Although Filtering Rules prevent data from being stored in MongoDB, it's important to understand that this process still requires server resources. When data is sent from the device to the server, the server must apply the filtering rules to decide whether or not to store the data.

Key Points:

• Server Processing - Even though filtered data is not saved in the database, it still undergoes server-side processing. This can impact server performance, especially if there is a high volume of data to filter.
• Database Load - The filtering rules themselves are stored in the database. Checking these rules for each incoming request can add some load to your database.

By using Filtering Rules thoughtfully, you can minimize unnecessary data processing and manage server load more effectively. This helps in maintaining an efficient system while ensuring that only valuable data is recorded.