PHP WordPress call in Javascript

I’ve been trying to implement a WP php call in Google Analytics code as described on this site
https://marketingtechblog.com/2009/03/12/how-to-track-by-author-with-google-analytics/

No matter what I try, WordPress doesn’t see the php is the js itself

var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-XXXXXX-X");
pageTracker._initData();
<?php if (is_single()) { ?>
pageTracker._trackPageview(”/author/<?php the_author() ?>”);
<? } ?>
pageTracker._trackPageview();

even stripping out the single call, the author call isn’t seen either

var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-XXXXXX-X");
pageTracker._initData();
pageTracker._trackPageview(”/author/<?php the_author() ?>”);
pageTracker._trackPageview();

The render works, but it doesn’t insert the <?php the_author() ?> like it wasn’t there.

Any ideas as to why WordPress would be ignoring the php call in the js?

thx