Can Survey123 both record speech and transcribe it at the same time?

[MichaelBell]

We have a need for a user, in a survey, to enter text into a field. This is fair enough, but in order to make it faster, the user can speak and have the text transcribed into the field.

This is possible, at the moment, through using the device's own mic and dictation, which works pretty well.

However, ideally we also want to store this speech in case of it being misheard and not transcribed properly, and also so we can listen for stresses. Now, Survey123 allows us to record audio, fine and dandy.

But can we also transcribe and save into text at the same time?

There was this (https://twitter.com/arcgissurvey123/status/992947053729902592 ) which looks similar, but on closer inspection they're just pasting text in. I was thinking it may be possible to script something together but I doubt it's possible to script something which also activates the device's dictation on a text field.

[Anonymous User · Accepted solution]

Hi @MichaelBell,

This is currently not possible, there is no feature to record audio and transcribe text at the same time into an input field. As you point out, the transcription of text is managed by the OS and the keyboard in use. The best option you have is to use an audio question (or several), start it recording at the start the survey or start of a question or section (group) and record what the user says as part of the text transcription. You would need to ensure they end the recording and save the audio file, before submitting the survey,

Regards,

Phil.