Accessing a public survey inbox through the Survey123 app

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08-07-2017 11:27 AM
MickHuska_Jr__ALLETE_
New Contributor III

Can the inbox be viewed without logging into ArcGIS online?

When sharing a public survey (the URL under the collaborate tab) the user bypasses the esri login screen and downloads the survey in the app. Once the survey is downloaded, the inbox icon appears (as configured in survey123 connect) however, no survey results are visible. If the refresh button is selected, the app prompts a login to ArcGIS online. Is this expected behavior?

Thanks,

-Mick 

1 Solution

Accepted Solutions
JohnathanHasthorpe
Esri Regular Contributor

Hi Mick

Yes this is expected behaviour. Public surveys are designed for crowd source type activities, not enterprise data editing workflows. I do accept that seeing the inbox may create some confusion for public surveys and will look at ways to improve this.

Thanks

John

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34 Replies
JohnathanHasthorpe
Esri Regular Contributor

Hi Mick

Yes this is expected behaviour. Public surveys are designed for crowd source type activities, not enterprise data editing workflows. I do accept that seeing the inbox may create some confusion for public surveys and will look at ways to improve this.

Thanks

John

GlenGardner1
New Contributor III

Can the behavior be change so that the inbox can populate for a public survey without a sign-in? I would like to have people crowd source information only for sites I have selected in advance.

Jesper_FogtNielsen
Esri Contributor

Hi Mick / Johnathan

I also have a question regarding use of inbox in Survey123:

I am working on a survey 123 Connect where citizens in a municipality are editing and updating existing data about invasive hogweed-plants.

The municipality wants to monitor and make sure that each citizen with hogweed on their property, is being active in the extermination of the plant. The extermination is part of Danish legislation and using Survey123 would be a very effective improvement that hopefully all municipalities would be interested in.

Will it be possible in a future update to use the inbox in a public survey without arcgis login? If so, any idea when?

If no, do you have any suggestions to other Esri-apps that might have the functionality to edit existing data in crowdsourcing? - and also report new observations.

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Kind regards

Jesper

JohnathanHasthorpe
Esri Regular Contributor

Hi Glen and Jesper

Thanks for the information regarding your workflows. Unfortunately, at the current version (2.5) the inbox does require a logged in named user. However, in line with a number of requests for inbox access in public surveys - we are looking at this as a potential enhancement request.

If anyone else has this requirement - please reply to this thread.

Thanks

John

ChristopherMatechik
New Contributor III

Based on James Tedrick reply I realize this may not be possible. However, since Johnathan Hasthorpe asked anybody else who has this need to reply, I will explain how it would benefit me.

I run a sea turtle nest survey. Nests are documented the morning they are found and then monitored for the next 70 days until they hatch. During this time, any subsequent damage to the nests (e.g. storm damage, poaching, predation) is recorded as it occurs and after 70 days hatch rates are recorded. The survey was originally designed for state employees who had ArcGIS accounts. They would use the inbox feature to pull up old nests and update the record when damage occurred. However, we now have 18 miles of private beaches that are surveyed by volunteers. At first, they would use paper data sheets and drop them off for state employees to enter using the Survey123 app (which defeats the purpose of having the app). After working with my organization to open the app up to the public I discovered that we will still need paper data sheets to document any subsequent damage to the nest and hatch rates. This is a sever limitation.

If the inbox can't be made public is there another way to solve this problem. The only way I can think of, which would require some restructuring, is to make each event (e.g. nest laid, subsequent damage, hatch rate evaluation) a separate survey entry and then join the data together during post processing. A select_one question at the beginning of the survey could be used to determine relevancies for the follow up questions.  A unique nest ID could be used to join surveys relating to the same nests. This makes sense but it is a little disappointing. My survey was originally structured this way but end users found this confusing so we switched to using the inbox to update surveys. Now it seems we might need to switch back or just have our volunteers use paper surveys.

SaraMiller
New Contributor III

@JohnathanHasthorpe, I also need functionality for members of the public to download records to the Inbox and be able to update them.  Similar to @ChristopherMatechik, I run beach-nesting bird surveys for endangered species, which are conducted by members of the public.  Each nest has its own record which has a repeat in it for daily observations to be added. 

The form records the nest location, ID, and summary of previous observations as part of the parent data, so when the record is opened from the Inbox, the volunteer surveyor can see the "nest history" and can then add a repeat record for their own observation. 

Different surveyors will monitor nests from day-to-day, so they cannot simply use the "Sent" box to "edit and resend" surveys, because this is only possible for surveys submitted from the same device, and also doesn't prevent surveyors from editing previously entered daily observations in the repeat section.

Keeping a single nest record for each nest avoids duplication or complication of records and allows users to view the nest history, instead of submitting separate records for every nest-day observation and doing loads of data cleaning and collating in post-processing.  It also risks erroneous observations and incomplete data if surveyors cannot see what nest status details were entered during previous visits.

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by Anonymous User
Not applicable

Hi @SaraMiller@DanielDiaz1@MickHuska_Jr__ALLETE_@DanBihari ,

We are currently working on enabling the Inbox for public surveys, and this feature will be available in the next release of Survey123, currently planned for 3.13.

Please join and keep an eye out in the Survey123 Early Adopter Community, so once the 3.13 beta builds are available with this feature, you can test it out with your surveys and provide feedback.

Regards,

Phil.

MatthewGuilliatt
New Contributor III

That's great to hear - I need access to this as well. Do you know when 3.13 is to be released?

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by Anonymous User
Not applicable

Hi @MatthewGuilliatt,

The 3.13 release should be available around the UC, so closer to end of June or early July.

Regards,

Phil.

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