This is an R script that allows you to analyze active users by sign up cohort. You can read more about it in this blog post.

If you've never used R before, you'll need to install R and optionally download a tool like RStudio to run this script. You'll also need to install the ggplot2 package with install.packages("ggplot2") and use setwd() to change the working directory to match the location of this script.

If you run a web or mobile app, you might be interested to know how many active users your app has each month. This R script will not only help you figure that out, but it will break down the active users each month into cohorts based on when the user was first seen.

In order for it to work, all you need to do is to generate a CSV file containing a list of user ids and dates when the users performed actions in your app. Here's an example:

2	2010-03-28
2	2010-04-09
2	2010-04-10
2	2010-05-16
3	2010-01-31
3	2014-05-07
3	2014-09-30
3	2015-04-11
4	2010-01-31
4	2010-10-06

The provided data/test-data.csv contains a test dataset that you can use to test the script.

You'll need to edit the CSV_PATH and CSV_SEPARATOR at the top of active-users.r depending on where you place the data file and whether the file comma-separated or tab-separated.

Within RStudio, simply load the script using source("active-users.r"). If all went well, it should generate the following chart:

If you have any suggestions, find a bug, or just want to say hey drop me a note at @mhmazur on Twitter or by email at [email protected].

MIT © Matt Mazur