topic Re: Survey123 With Multiple Location Points Data Loss in ArcGIS Survey123 Questions

Survey123 With Multiple Location Points Data Loss

LSK — Mon, 06 Oct 2025 21:31:17 GMT

I recently hosted a Survey123 with multiple teams inputting data. I had set the survey up to collect 4 different, but nearby, coordinate points within a site (I.e. four locational “questions” in survey).

I can only seem to find and visualize one set of coordinates. Is there a way to get the four different coordinates that teams set at their sites or are those lost? And what then are the coordinates that are saved in X and Y columns? The locations do approximate where sites should be.

We did not get any errors or notices that the data would not be saved. I have now learned about repeats trying to answer my question.

Re: Survey123 With Multiple Location Points Data Loss

Neal_t_k — Tue, 07 Oct 2025 13:19:48 GMT

What version of Survey123 Connect are you using? The current version doesn't let you publish a survey with more than one geometry unless they are in repeats.

If you can still modify your form, you could set geopoints 2-4 to null in the bind::esri:fieldType column and use pulldata to get the x and y locations and store as decimals in calculated questions. It wouldn't quite be the same as they wouldn't show on a map, but you are still capturing the additional point locations.

https://doc.arcgis.com/en/survey123/desktop/create-surveys/geopoints.htm#ESRI_SECTION1_0C78C5A67E824AC9A4EB47693D47D151

Re: Survey123 With Multiple Location Points Data Loss

TylerGraham2 — Tue, 07 Oct 2025 18:39:52 GMT

If you're collecting data from multiple points in a survey the way to go about that is via a repeat. A new repeat record for each point and they are stored in a related table and are related to the parent record. You can't have 4 geometry questions in a table of a survey, you're allowed one (repeats can have 1 per repeat table too since they are separate tables in the database schema).

That being said you can have 4 geometry questions in a survey as long as at least 3 of them are not actually collecting spatial data. I do this to run some calculations to produce and animal location based on observer location and distance bearings. To do that you set the column bind::esri:fieldType for that question to null. It creates a question in the survey, but doesn't record the data in the feature layer. However, you can pass data from the null spatial question to other survey questions using calculations. For example you can have a user set a point on a map and then use calculate to put the Lat/Long values of the point in separate fields.

If your users always have 4 points to collect you can get by with it this way, but if the amount of points varies, you really need to use a repeat table for the spatial question since that will allow flexibility; you could collect 1 to say 30 points.

Re: Survey123 With Multiple Location Points Data Loss

LSK — Fri, 17 Oct 2025 14:58:36 GMT

I didn't use Survey123 Connect, just Survey123. I did not know about Survey123 Connect or repeats prior to the survey. Since it did not give me or users any error when placing 4 points in 4 separate questions, I assumed it would collected each lat/long pair. Do I assume these data are gone, and only the first question lat/long were recorded?

The survey has been completed, so I now know techniques for future surveys I am just trying to figure out if this data is somewhere or gone.

Re: Survey123 With Multiple Location Points Data Loss

LSK — Fri, 17 Oct 2025 14:59:19 GMT

This is a very helpful technique. But does not help my previously collected survey results. Do I assume these data are gone, and only the first question lat/long were recorded?

Re: Survey123 With Multiple Location Points Data Loss

TylerGraham2 — Fri, 17 Oct 2025 15:28:32 GMT

I would say it is gone because it was never collected by the survey, since there can be only 1 geometry field per table.