Enabling Tracking Stats

Highlight and Share can be used to track stats for the social networks you interact with.

Overview

When a user shares content (via a social button or Web Share), the plugin can send a share event to your analytics stack. Stats are on by default; you can turn them off globally or restrict which data is sent for privacy.

Three channels receive the same event (when stats are enabled):

Channel	Purpose
dataLayer	Google Tag Manager (and any GTM-based tags).
gtag	Google Analytics 4 when gtag() is present on the page.
CustomEvent	Custom listeners (e.g. window.addEventListener('has:share', ...)).

If stats are disabled, nothing is pushed to any channel.

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Event name

Context	Event name
dataLayer / CustomEvent	has:share
GA4 (gtag)	has:share (same; GA4 params are separate).

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Data sent (payload)

The event carries a small payload. By default, URL, share text, and title are not sent (they are sent as empty strings). Enable enhanced mode to include them.

dataLayer & CustomEvent (camelCase)

Field	When populated	Description
event	Always	Event name, e.g. has:share.
hasShareType	Always	Type of share, e.g. text, image.
hasSocialNetwork	Always	Network or method, e.g. twitter, pinterest, webshare.
hasShareText	Enhanced only	Selected or shared text (privacy-sensitive).
hasSharePostUrl	Enhanced only	URL being shared (privacy-sensitive).
hasSharePostTitle	Enhanced only	Title of the content (privacy-sensitive).

GA4 (gtag) — snake_case parameters

Parameter	When populated	Description
has_share_type	Always	Same as hasShareType.
has_social_network	Always	Same as hasSocialNetwork.
has_share_text	Enhanced only	Same as hasShareText.
has_share_post_url	Enhanced only	Same as hasSharePostUrl.
has_share_post_title	Enhanced only	Same as hasSharePostTitle.

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Synthetic events (CustomEvent)

The plugin dispatches a synthetic CustomEvent on window so your own scripts (or GTM custom HTML tags) can react to shares without relying on dataLayer or gtag.

What is sent

The event is dispatched as:

• Event type: has:share
• Target: window
• Options: { bubbles: true, cancelable: false }
• Payload: The same payload as dataLayer is in event.detail (camelCase). When enhanced is off, hasShareText, hasSharePostUrl, and hasSharePostTitle are empty strings.

Property	Type	Description
event.detail.event	string	Event name (has:share).
event.detail.hasShareType	string	Share type, e.g. text, image.
event.detail.hasSocialNetwork	string	Network/method, e.g. twitter, webshare.
event.detail.hasShareText	string	Share text (empty unless enhanced).
event.detail.hasSharePostUrl	string	Shared URL (empty unless enhanced).
event.detail.hasSharePostTitle	string	Content title (empty unless enhanced).

How to listen

Attach a listener to window for the event type has:share. Read the payload from event.detail.

window.addEventListener( 'has:share', function( event ) {
    var payload = event.detail;
    console.log( 'Share:', payload.hasSocialNetwork, payload.hasShareType );
    // Optional: send to your own analytics or API.
} );

// With enhanced enabled, you can use URL, text, and title.
window.addEventListener( 'has:share', function( event ) {
    var payload = event.detail;
    if ( payload.hasSharePostUrl ) {
        console.log( 'Shared URL:', payload.hasSharePostUrl );
    }
} );

The listener runs only when stats are enabled (has_stats_enabled / HAS_STATS_ENABLED). If stats are disabled, no CustomEvent is dispatched.

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Constants

Define these in wp-config.php (or before the plugin runs) to set defaults. Filters can still override them.

HAS_STATS_ENABLED

• Default: Stats are enabled (no constant = tracking on).
• Use: Set to false to turn off all stats (dataLayer, gtag, and CustomEvent).

// In wp-config.php: disable all share tracking.
define( 'HAS_STATS_ENABLED', false );

HAS_STATS_ENHANCED

• Default: Enhanced data is off (no constant = URL, text, and title are not sent).
• Use: Set to true to allow sending URL, share text, and title in the payload.

// In wp-config.php: allow sending URL, share text, and title.
define( 'HAS_STATS_ENHANCED', true );

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Filters

Use these in your theme or plugin to override the constants or implement conditional logic.

has_stats_enabled

• Purpose: Turn stats on or off for the frontend.
• Default passed: Value from HAS_STATS_ENABLED if defined, otherwise true.
• Return: true to enable, false to disable.

// Disable all stats (e.g. for EU unless consent given).
add_filter( 'has_stats_enabled', function( $enabled ) {
    return false; // or your consent check.
} );

// Or use the helper.
add_filter( 'has_stats_enabled', '__return_false' );

// Enable only when a consent cookie is set.
add_filter( 'has_stats_enabled', function( $enabled ) {
    return isset( $_COOKIE['analytics_consent'] ) && $_COOKIE['analytics_consent'] === 'yes';
} );

has_stats_enhanced

• Purpose: Allow or disallow sending URL, share text, and title (privacy-sensitive fields).
• Default passed: Value from HAS_STATS_ENHANCED if defined, otherwise false.
• Return: true to send enhanced fields, false to send empty strings for them.

// Enable enhanced data (URL, text, title) when stats are on.
add_filter( 'has_stats_enhanced', '__return_true' );

// Enable enhanced only for logged-in admins (example).
add_filter( 'has_stats_enhanced', function( $enhanced ) {
    return current_user_can( 'manage_options' );
} );