UsageCount

UsageCount is a metric used in software analytics to denote how many times a specific resource, feature, or operation has been invoked. It is usually represented as a counter that increments with each use and can be scoped to different levels, such as per user, per session, per resource, or globally. The value is often stored in a persistence layer or a time-series database, and may be reported alongside timestamps or within defined time windows.

In implementation, a UsageCount is typically a monotonically increasing integer. In high-concurrency environments, the counter should be updated atomically to avoid race conditions. Some systems maintain rolling or per-window counts to reflect activity within a recent period, while others keep a cumulative total. Reporting may be done at regular intervals or on-demand, with care taken to avoid double counting and to handle resets after deployments or data migrations.

Common applications include API usage statistics, feature adoption analytics, license or quota checks, and debugging or performance analysis. UsageCount can help identify hot paths, detect regression, forecast demand, and guide product decisions.

Considerations include privacy and data retention policies, sampling strategies for large-scale telemetry, integer overflow risk, and the need to distinguish genuine usage from test or automated activity. When designing a UsageCount, teams should decide on scope, update semantics, aggregation granularity, and retention plans.

See also: telemetry, metrics, counters, event logging.