The Problem Space
A web request is a request made by a client, such as a web browser, to a server in order to retrieve a web page or other resource. Web requests are sent using the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), a standard protocol for transmitting data on the World Wide Web. The way Cloudflare delivers and treats requests varies considerably and users might have hundreds of websites dealing with a few users to millions. This is where the problem lies… Users want to know that their setup is performing as expected and before Cloudflare Trace, they had no way to figure this out for themselves.
The Solution
Once a trace is initiated, the dashboard returns a visualisation of the products that were matched on a request, along with the specific rules inside these phases that were applied. Users can then view further details of the filters and actions the specific rule undertakes. Clicking the rule id will take them directly to that specific rule in the Cloudflare Dashboard, allowing them to edit filters and actions if needed. The UI also generates a programmatic version of the trace that can be used by users to run traces via a command line. This enables use of tools like jq to further investigate the extensive details returned via the trace output.
My Role
Lead Designer and Product Strategist