Reuse Field Entries in Survey123

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03-09-2020 08:40 AM
BenWalker
Esri Contributor

In the January 2020 release of Collector there was the following new feature

Reuse Field Entries

Now you can easily reuse values that you previously entered into your form to minimize repetitive data entry and spelling mistakes. This can be quite useful when entering frequently used text such as a street name or Inspector.

Directly above the keyboard, in the keyboard accessory view, you can tap on “Recent Values” and find up to  3 previous values entered for that field to choose from.

Are there any plans to add this Survey123? This would be very helpful.

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11 Replies
Shwu-jingJeng
Esri Regular Contributor

Hi Ben,

In Survey123 field app, we provide the option "Set as favorite answers" for fields you have repeat answers. This would be similar to the Reuse Field Entries function you mentioned.

leo_SwissGIS
New Contributor III

Hi,

The option "Set as favorite answers" is quite different than the new option that Ben is talking about available in Collector:

   - It saves all the answers of one survey and copy all of them in the target survey

   - Only one set of answers can be saved

We would really appreciate to have the equivalent of Collector "Reuse entry field" in Survey, as the use of the "set as favorite answers" is very limited and not much appreciated by our field staff. It is only relevant for informations that are common for all the surveys (weather of the day, date, name of user…) but not for more specific questions.

We think the "Reuse entry field" as an extent of lists, or as an history function: each project may have its own objects to inspect but those objects are not necessarily known before going on the field, so it is not possible to prepare a choice list.

As an exemple, during asbestos inspections, each building may have their own objects that should be assessed, and those objects can be encountered several time (pipes, glue on floor tile, specific painting...). Currently, it is not possible to group them by type while processing the data as the user need to rewrite every time the name of the object (time consuming), leading to many typos.

We have many other projects where this will be relevant: when we want our observations to refer to another one made before,

recurrent measured values… This would be a really functional enhancement for field users.
We were excited to see that this was implemented in Collector, hope this will be implemented soon for Survey123 (maybe we should create an ArcGIS Idea for that?).
Léo
  

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Shwu-jingJeng
Esri Regular Contributor

Hi Leo,

Yes, please create an ArcGIS Idea for this and when the vote is higher, it would move to the priority of this enhancement implementation.

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DougBrowning
MVP Esteemed Contributor

For us I was able to setup a "defaults" page to be used throughout the repeat.  So if we keep hitting the same thing over and over we can set a default and then reuse it.  Not sure if it will help you but it was a big hit with our crew.

https://community.esri.com/thread/205999-is-it-possible-to-auto-populate-previous-data-into-current-... 

I do agree a learning reuse would be awesome.  I also really wish the list could resort as you pick and thus "learn".

Hope that helps

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BenWalker
Esri Contributor

Do favorites get cleared once I send my survey does the favorite list gets wiped? that seems to be the case when I just tried it.

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Shwu-jingJeng
Esri Regular Contributor

Hi Ben,

What version of field app do you use? With 3.9 RC, the favorites did keep as "Paste answers from favortei" and it won't be erased unless you change the favorite answers.

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BenWalker
Esri Contributor

I did my test using version 3.9.145 on windows 10.

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Shwu-jingJeng
Esri Regular Contributor

That's what I have here as well. Are you seeing different behavior with favorites at your end?

Mh workflow is:

-open the survey, fill in the question, and set the favorite answer.

-send the survey.

-collect the survey again and click the paste answer from favorites and the fields now filled in the previous answer.

-send the survey.

The above workflow can be repeart using the past answer from favorites everytime though.

What is your workflow that you are seeing the answers got erased?

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BenWalker
Esri Contributor

Hi,

Here is my workflow

this is on Windows 10 with RC 3.9.145

  • Open my survey
  • Open the inbox
  • Click on a survey
  • Fill some answers, just the ones on the first page
  • Submit the survey, and select to send it now. I can see that the survey that is being sent has a star next to it to show that it has favourite answers.
  • Return to the inbox, select a new survey
  • click on the menu to select to add the favourites, but it is not letting me

Do favorites work when using the inbox?

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