How do I delay the execution of Tealium?

[loldenburg]

On our website, we get some data from another service asynchronously, e.g. the other service is called and some data returned and written into a JavaScript object. 

We want to copy this data into the utag_data object and map it to several Web Analytics tools.

But there is a race condition of course: We cannot bet on the other service to have the data ready when the Tealium script starts to run. So what I would like to do is to have the Tealium script wait until the other data is there via Polling.

Is there a way to do this via a Pre-Loader Extension?

By the way, I know there is the "noview" config parameter, but setting this parameter is too risky for me as it changes the entire loading logic.

[steve_lake]

Hi,

The "noview" parameter is going to be the only 100% reliable way of doing it, otherwise it's always a race condition and all you're doing is tipping the odds in favour of it working.

Thanks
Steve Lake

[meng_lim]

@loldenburg,

Building off of @steve_lake's comments, this will disable the initial pageview trigger that "utag.js" sends by default when it is loaded.

When doing so, you then will have to have to fully gather/generate all your data points into your data object (e.g. utag_data).  Once you know you have all the data you need in your object, then you'll manually trigger the your page view call, passing in your data object.

For example:

// Waiting for 3rd-party data to come back here
var thirdPartyData = "foo";

// Pushed 3rd-party data into my utag_data object
window.utag_data = window.utag_data || {};
window.utag_data.product_id = thirdPartyData;

// Then manually trigger your page view
utag.view(utag_data);

There's really no other robust solution as Tealium does not know when your asynchronous service will finish and return its data.  You will have to control that logic and manually send the page view call when you have received your data.

Just to reiterate as Steve already mentioned, using the "noview" override will 100% disable the page view call from triggering before your third-party service finishes.

Hope this helps!

[loldenburg]

Hi @meng_lim and Steve Data Lake,

thanks, not what I wanted but totally understandable.

I cannot change the HTML on the page itself. Is it viable to fire the utag.view through a DOM Ready Extension or a Pre-Loader Extension?

What if I have other DOM Ready Extensions that are supposed to fire Event Calls right after the Pageview? My fear is that they will fire before the pageview call.

Best

Lukas

[meng_lim]

@loldenburg,

Are your DOM-Ready scoped extensions relying on this other service?  If so, then you will have to change the scope of your extension(s) to execute when the other service has finished.  Otherwise, you will continue to run into issue of a race condition.

All track calls (i.e. view/link) will have to be consolidated to fire when and only when your other service(s) has finished and returned its data back to you.