The same DeviceID is appearing on different devices' submissions

[jcucsc]

Hi folks,

The DeviceID values show up as if only two devices are being used for our field survey, when we've used and submitted from roughly 10 devices. 

These are devices from an institution and may be logged into the same iCloud account, and several of them may be logged into the same ArcGIS single sign on account (through our institution). The surveys are done offline.

I'm wondering why this is happening and what solutions we can try.

Is it possible that when a particular ArcGIS account submits the inbox from their device, all of the surveys associated with that account (even surveys completed on other devices) get submitted and pull only one deviceID?

Thank you so much for any help! 

Similar (unanswered) question here, from a year ago: 

https://community.esri.com/t5/arcgis-survey123-questions/same-deviceid-populating-on-different-devic...

[jcarlson]

Are these edits to existing features, or newly created features?

[abureaux]

As @jcarlson alluded to, Device ID doesn't update once it has been set.

New survey on PC:

Editing a survey PC sent from phone via Inbox:

This is the case for a lot of those special hidden values. The one that annoys me the most is survey version not updating...

[jcucsc]

Hi @abureaux , maybe I'm not understanding, but I don't know if this gets at my question. The issue I'm having is that I know iPad #2 and iPad #4 both contain surveys in the Inbox and both submitted separately,  and yet the Device ID for surveys from one device matches the Device ID for surveys from the other device. 

Sorry if I'm not understanding your response! 

[abureaux]

All I was saying is that once the "Device ID" is set in S123, it won't change.

If your users are accessing surveys via the Inbox, then the next question is "how did the surveys get into the Inbox?"

If the user clicks "Collect" to collect a new survey, then Device ID is set as the survey loads. They can then submit that survey, and the Device ID will be unique to their device.

If the user goes into the Inbox and clicks "Refresh" and grabs something from the list, then that user may not have put the survey there, meaning the Device ID wont be theirs, and it wont be updated when they submit.

[jcucsc]

Hi @abureaux, ok I think I understand. We are doing surveys offline, and people are clicking "collect" to collect a new survey. Nobody is selecting refresh.

The issue is that somehow, surveys from different iPads have the exact same Device ID (we get only two Device IDs no matter how many devices were used that day). 

[abureaux]

James Tedrick (2018):

As devices that lack cellular connections do not have IMEI and iOS does not allow access to the IMEI, Survey123 generates a unique ID for the deviceid property. This value does not change between app updates, but will change in iOS devices if Survey123 is uninstalled and reinstalled.

I am not aware of any super in depth article on the deviceid parameter. I believe it is Qt (the current codebase for S123) native though. It sounds like deviceid is randomly generated by S123. Given that, there is a chance, however small, for duplicates. I compared identicle devices from within my org and noted that all device ids appeared different, meaning the device id shouldn't be representative of a device's model/os/etc.

Would be interesting to set up a small test to see if they are truly unique. Just have them pop open the survey on their devices and compare Device IDs. Then do the same on a different device.

[jcucsc]

Hi @jcarlson , thanks for your help with this. I don't totally understand the question (very new to Survey123 - this is our first project with it). What do you mean by "these" and "edits" in "Are these edits to existing features"?

DeviceID was added after the apps were installed and the survey had already been published and downloaded to the devices - but the survey was also updated, if that gets at your question.