Why my Reg Exp in ga:filters is changed in the final request?

Question

I am working on a GA-API stuff and I found the tool: http://ga-dev-tools.appspot.com/explorer/ very useful.

But when I copy the Reg Exp into my own code as follows:

function queryCoreReportingApi(profileId) {
  gapi.client.analytics.data.ga.get({
    'ids': 'ga:' + profileId,
    'start-date': lastNDays(30),
    'end-date': lastNDays(0),
    'metrics': 'ga:visitors',
    'dimensions': 'ga:pagePath',
    'sort': '-ga:visitors',
    'filters': 'ga:pagePath=~/q-\d+/.+',
    'max-results': 50
  }).execute(handleCoreReportingResults);
}

I can't get any result.

I found that filters: "ga:pagePath=~/q-\d+/.+",

is changed to filters: "ga:pagePath=~/q-d+/.+"

The \d becomes d and I failed to get what I want.

Why the \ is just gone? Any tips?

Thanks!

Answer 1

Aw, looking at the filter reference, I would suggest escaping the backslash. So technically, you would end up with double backslashes:

"ga:pagePath=~/q-\\d+/.+",

See the linked page, section Filter Expressions:

Reserved characters — The semicolon, comma, and backslash must all be backslash escaped when they appear in an expression.

Hope this helps.