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Any way to recover discarded survey

AndyMcClary

This is a longshot but is there any way to recover survey data if a surveyor accidently clicked Discard Survey rather than Continue Survey when reopening a survey after Survey123 crashed?

We've been experiencing persistent issues with Survey123 crashing when tablets go to sleep as well as when toggling between apps (particularly Field Maps) and today, after having Survey123 crash, one of our technicians re-opened the app and accidently clicked discard survey, deleting 10 hours of work. Any way to recover this survey would be a huge relief. Failing that I'd like to see a second question before deleting survey data.

Thanks

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dougbrowning

Did you maybe just update to 15.5? We are now seeing sleep issues. It does crash when flipping apps on the regular now also.

https://community.esri.com/t5/arcgis-survey123-questions/ios-15-5-is-crashing-123-and-losing-some-data-when/m-p/1189560#M43604

thanks

AndyMcClary

We'd been having this issue before updating but it does seem to be getting worse. We mostly use Androids (Trimble TDC 600s) but I've heard that some of our crew has seen the same behavior on their personal ios devices. It's also been an issue with at least two of our surveys so it's not specific to one survey design. They do both have repeats but that's never been an issue before. I'm a little at a loss with this since we can't really afford to lose data out in the field like this.

RobertBorchert

My answer does not help but is a suggestion for best practices. If you have a survey that is so big that 10 hours worth of work can go into it by the field technicians, I would strongly suggest breaking your survey into smaller portions.

I would speculate that it is crashing because the survey is being stored in the active memory of your mobile devices and it is interfering with the operation of your device.

You may also try a change in methodology. Even if the survey is not completed have them submit it.

Then utilize the inbox to EDIT a submitted survey. That way a copy of what has been completed is on your server.

AndyMcClary

Thanks for the suggestions. A good portion of the 10 hours is spent hiking to the survey and carrying out the measurements, with relatively little time spent actually recording data (thus the issues with the tablet going to sleep). The survey consists of a Parent (20 Fields) Child (30 Fields) and grandchild (18 Fields). On a typical survey there might be 40 child records and 40 grandchild records total. Maybe @IsmaelChivite or @JamesTedrick can weigh in on whether that's too much for working memory. I'd really rather not split it into more records since that would require significant modification to our data structure but if necessary that could be an option. I've also got a couple simple javascript functions in the form for QAQC that I could take out if that would help. They generally aren't working anyway since we're out of cell reception so as soon as Survey123 crashes we get logged out and javascript doesn't run.

I've considered using the submit button as a manual save and will probably do that as a temporary measure but it's definitely a hassle for field crews so I'd like to avoid that if possible (plus having the app crash all the time is undercutting crew confidence).

dougbrowning

Your forms are way smaller than mine so you should be fine on that. We are 5 years in and this is the first year we have been getting crashes.

Careful with using submit or even drafts. Some calcs do not fire when coming back from drafts. Some of my complicated forms flat out fall apart when going to drafts. But I would test yours and see since then at least it is saved in the DB on the tablet.

We struggle with this also since they may have to do some of the form, then hike, then more form. The other big one is the GPS running non stop. There have been many posts to fix this, or add a toggle, and I am not sure why it has not happened. I really feel it is a big "flaw" in 123 that drains batteries.

For your original ask I am pretty sure discard and its gone. But grab the DB off the tablet and check to make sure. Start here https://support.esri.com/en/technical-article/000024617 and https://doc.arcgis.com/en/survey123/desktop/get-answers/troubleshootgetanswers.htm#ESRI_SECTION1_A972F8032F3541B1B1809D81B2D4BED9

Hope that helps

AndyMcClary

Thanks - I was pretty sure the size wouldn't be an issue since I've done much more complicated forms before and not had any problems. We've even been having issues this summer running an extremely simple s123 form that's been in use for years if we also have Field Maps going.

Unfortunately, to answer the original question - it was definitely gone - nothing in the database. I'd really like to see that discard behavior changed - it's just way to easy for crews to accidently tap the button.

dougbrowning

Same. I thought it was since I was using the TestFlight version a lot. But ever since the new calc engine came out I see a lot more crashes. Pretty much from near 0 to nearly every time.

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