Data loss after survey sent

Question

Hi,

Today I am seeing a new problem.  User in the field has completed a survey with all required fields as per the xlsform, then sent.  Send is successful, a new object appears in the table but this object does not have all the data that was on the completed survey.  I know this must be an error in transmission somewhere because most of the missing data is for fields with required set to 'yes' on the xlsform, so would not be able to be sent without it being populated in the field app.

Getting frustrated with the number of roadblocks!!  Please help?

MattCreaney · Answer

Hi Zachary Sutherby and mark dynge

Thanks for your replies.  Here's my assumption of what has happened:

1/ Field technician correctly completes and submits survey from field app

2/ Field technician re-opens sent survey in field app, makes changes and notices that status field still says "draft" (this field changes automatically via an Integromat scenario), so changes to "submitted" before submitting again

3/ When the survey sees this field is "submitted" it hides all the fields with ${status}!='submitted' in the relevant column

4/ Re-sent survey therefore misses all of these fields and overwrites the existing record

5/ Data gone

I have since edited my surveys to have the status field hidden and am not aware of a problem since.

Anonymous User · Answer

This might be too simple, but I have seen people hit the space bar for an answer to a question, (If not restricted), Is that accounted for?

ZacharySutherby · Answer

Hello Matt Creaney‌,

That is weird that no error message is obtained when submitting. If the behavior is still being encountered does the behavior occur with all people submitting the survey or just one person? Is the behavior observed on a specific OS (IOS, Android, Windows) or all OS's? Are you using ArcGIS Online or ArcGIS Enterprise? Is the device registered with an MDM or connected to a VPN when submitting?

A few troubleshooting workflows would be to grab the Survey123 diagnostic logs which can be enabled by opening the menu on the app's home page, select Settings, select the Diagnostics tab, enable logging. You can grab the logs from the device and see if there are any error messages there. Since no error is thrown I would think that there would not be much information in the logs, but something to double check.

The best way to see what the app is sending is to download a program called Fiddler, configure it to decrypt HTTPS traffic, and then configure it with the mobile device. This will show what the Field App is sending to the portal and confirm if those fields are populated or not. This will narrow the issue down to the Survey123 Field App, a firewall or environment issue, or the Web GIS infrastructure.

If the behavior is still happening I would recommend creating a ticket with Esri Technical Support and they will be able to assist grabbing this troubleshooting information and interpreting the results.

Thank you,

Zach