Best way to collect Year data in Survey123?

Question

Sorking on a Survey123 form to collect information about fire hydrants.  One of the things I need to collect is Year Cast (Stamped on hydrant).  I am not sure the best way to do this.  Option one is to collect as a type date and then calculate the value into a non date field (integer or text).  Another is just to collect it as a integer or text to start.  Am am thinking of how to constrain the entry to a valid year (and not have to edit the survey it every year).  Also what is the bet method if input spinner, keyboard, etc.

If anyone has an experience or advice I would appreciate the feed back.

Ismael Chivite‌

James Tedrick‌

JamesTedrick · Answer

Hi Dena,

The date type will still store a full date-time object, corresponding to January 1, <Year> 12:00.  This may be sufficient for your reporting requirement, but isn't the simple year-as-number.

DenaS1 · Answer

James,

Is there any way to use the date type and the year appearance to get a 4 digit year in your data, without having to add a hidden row with that calculation?

int(format-date(${q}, "%Y")) worked for me if I added it to a new row in XML as a hidden data type, but not if I included it in the original line of data.

JamesTedrick · Answer

Hi Christopher,

Look at the format-date() function in Formulas—Survey123 for ArcGIS | ArcGIS which can extract parts of a date (as text).  To convert to a number, you would need to the int() function as well:

int(format-date(${q}, "%Y"))