topic Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure in ArcGIS Survey123 Questions

survey123 connect- directory folder structure

Lake_Worth_BeachAdmin — Thu, 07 Dec 2017 20:02:50 GMT

Inside Survey123 Connect you are presented with all of your survey projects inside one "directory" or window. Is there a way to create "folders" or "groups" to place surveys into to organize our projects? I am working on 20+ unique surveys for m,multiple agencies/departments and its a mess in here.... need some sort of organization method.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

JamesTedrick — Fri, 08 Dec 2017 00:38:52 GMT

Hi Joe,

First, once a survey is published, it will be hidden if you are logged in as a user that is not the publisher, so that can provide some organization.

Secondly, there are a couple of geeky workarounds you could do with a bit of effort. All survey designs in Survey123 Connect are stored in "<user home>\ArcGIS\My Survey Designs"; you could create multiple folders to store the different projects and then switch the name appropriately (this works a bit better on a Mac because it supports Unix-style linking). You could also do the same by enabling git or another version control system and creating a branch for each customer.

Regardless, I've written down an enhancement issue to look into this. You mention that you have surveys across multiple agencies- would you have advice/suggestions for how this should be done?

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

Lake_Worth_BeachAdmin — Fri, 08 Dec 2017 12:51:31 GMT

I created sub directories in the path for survey designs and all surveys are still displayed the same in Connect. I am only concerned about organization of surveys in Connect. Folders like water, public services, electric (visible in connect) form there I can open those folders inside connect and see appropriate surveys.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

JamesTedrick — Fri, 08 Dec 2017 18:36:49 GMT

Sorry I wasn't clearer - the folders would exist elsewhere and you would fill My Survey Designs with the surveys of the folder with the surveys you wanted to work on.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

Anonymous User — Mon, 18 Dec 2017 18:39:48 GMT

James,

Is there a way to redirect Survey123 Connect to save surveys to a network drive/folder instead of a user folder on their system? We are concerned systems would fail and we would lose items we are working on that were not yet published. I see that no matter which login I use in Survey123 connect, it still points to the files on the computer. Is there a ways to point it to a network folder instead?

Thanks,
Victoria

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

Lake_Worth_BeachAdmin — Mon, 18 Dec 2017 18:48:00 GMT

this would also be extremely helpful for collaboration when developing surveys. More than one user (anyone on a shared network drive) could access the same .xls form without having to grab it from the organizational tab, download and re-create it with the copied form.

In addition,

users may not always be working on the workstation, sometimes we need to use other machines but if these files were on a network drive of our choosing this would eliminate that problem as well.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

Anonymous User — Mon, 18 Dec 2017 18:59:47 GMT

Joe, we also plan to collaborate with other GIS staff within our organization and the current set up is cumbersome and would be a bit tricky for new users. Having the software point to one network location would be more efficient for us as you had outlined. We also want to eliminate duplicate copies and searching for the updated copy on a number of devices. Furthermore, it is confusing when opening the Survey123 Connect software and having a My Survey Designs dashboard before you log in and then viewing another similar looking dashboard once you log into your Survey123 account; however, that dashboard contains another set of surveys that doesn't necessarily reflect the same information as the My Survey Designs dashboard page prior to logging in.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

Lake_Worth_BeachAdmin — Mon, 18 Dec 2017 19:02:31 GMT

I agree 100%. If this is currently a limitation it should be added to the Ideas page, and I would not think its too difficult to implement, just prompt the user where the directory should be to hold all the survey data.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

Anonymous User — Mon, 18 Dec 2017 19:08:44 GMT

Yes, I found it strange that I couldn't locate a settings option to change the path where the surveys are stored, but then I can see how it might affect where other files are written when creating surveys.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

JamesTedrick — Mon, 18 Dec 2017 19:21:51 GMT

Hi Victoria,

Thanks for the request. I've added your comments to the enhancement discussion was have for this feature.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

Anonymous User — Mon, 18 Dec 2017 20:44:39 GMT

James,

Can I add to that list? Sorry, I know this isn't related to this topic, but have some observations to add. Currently my Survey123 Connect does not prompt to save passwords and it times out without notification. Any improvements to this in future versions?

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

JamesTedrick — Mon, 18 Dec 2017 20:49:44 GMT

Hi Victoria,

Just to double-check, which version of Connect are you using? We previously had an issue with logins timing out, but that was addressed in 2.0 (April of this year).

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

Anonymous User — Mon, 18 Dec 2017 21:38:04 GMT

James, looks like I'm on 2.3.24. Upgrading to 2.5 now.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

GavinGoeldner — Thu, 08 Nov 2018 01:05:42 GMT

Any news on this enhancement request? It would be really heplful.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

Anonymous User — Fri, 07 Dec 2018 16:56:31 GMT

Hi James, I share the similar request as others here to be able to save survey designs to a network drive. I'm currently working with a federal government agency and we are encouraged to not to save work on the C: drive but instead to the network drive which is backed up. We need this option to support backup as well as collaboration with team members. Thank you for escalating this enhancement request.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

RonAnkeny — Fri, 18 Jan 2019 19:48:47 GMT

We have the same request but for a slightly different reason.

We are moving to a VDI structure of Virtual Machines for users, so when a user logs off it quite literally destroys the C: drive for the image the user was on, and the Survey 123 data with it. Please allow saving to a network location.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

ToriMetz — Wed, 27 Feb 2019 19:12:29 GMT

James Tedrick Any news on this? The Network location is becoming almost a must have to preserve one version of the truth. We even have a specified user name that will do our form creating and publishing to keep things consistent when turn over occurs but i need the final piece of a network location to save and access the surveys for connect.

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

PamelaLocke1 — Thu, 28 Mar 2019 15:01:58 GMT

Any headway on this? It would be very helpful. Thanks!

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

JessicaJackson — Thu, 19 Sep 2019 19:35:44 GMT

Is the enhancement discussion on the Ideas page? If so, could you please provide a link so we can upvote it?

Re: survey123 connect- directory folder structure

ChelseaRozek — Tue, 22 Jun 2021 08:47:28 GMT

Hi all! Just found this thread as I would love to have some organization in Survey123 Connect. I make all the surveys for my organization and find 40ish surveys lumped together from different departments and uses very confusing.

Please upvote these related Ideas I found:

Survey123 Form Organization

https://community.esri.com/ideas/13096