How to allow the entry of decimals in a Survey123 decimal field

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03-28-2018 10:35 AM
MattRapke
New Contributor II

I am trying to publish my first Survey123 survey that contains a decimal type field. I created the survey using Survey123 Connect, and everything worked fine in the form view on Connect. I published the survey and tried to do a test run to make sure that all the fields worked properly. When I copy-pasted a decimal number into the decimal field, the form converted the decimal to a comma. For example, if I copy 3.92 and paste it into the form, it shows up as 3,93. On the back-end the data is entered properly as a decimal, but the survey will be conducted in Canada and the users will be confused by the comma. Furthermore, I am unable to manually type a "." value into the decimal type field instead of a ",". Is there a setting I am missing to prevent this conversion and allow "." decimal entries?

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23 Replies
JamesTedrick
Esri Esteemed Contributor

Hi Matt,

This sounds like it may be a locale issue - what is the locale of the device you are entering data on?  Non-Canadian French locales would use the comma as a decimal mark.

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MattRapke
New Contributor II

I'm not sure how Survey123 determines computer location, but I am using my computer from my home in Bruce County, Ontario. I was connected over a VPN to the University of Guelph. It does the same thing whether or not I'm using the VPN. 

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JamesTedrick
Esri Esteemed Contributor

Hi Matt,

I'm referring to the device's locale (language/formatting settings) - this is normally an OS-wide setting.

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MattRapke
New Contributor II

I'm using Windows 10, I went to Settings > Time & Language > Region & Language. My country is set to Canada. I changed it to the U.S. to see if that would affect anything, but it didn't. Are those the settings you're referring to?

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MattRapke
New Contributor II

Hi James

I just installed Survey123 connect on a different computer and published a survey with only a single test question with a decimal field type. That survey also forces commas and prevents "." entries in the decimal field regardless of the computer that I use to enter the data. I don't think it's an issue that's local to both of my machines. 

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JamesTedrick
Esri Esteemed Contributor

Hi Matt,

What are you copying the number from- a text document, Excel, something else?  We are not able to reproduce this in Windows or Mac.

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MattRapke
New Contributor II

It doesn’t matter what I copy from, the result is always that the form transforms the decimal into a comma. When I try to manually enter the values using the keyboard I am unable to enter a “.” but the form will accept a single “,” as the decimal value. 

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JamesTedrick
Esri Esteemed Contributor

Cna I also ask you to check the advanced date/number settings just to make sure: 

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MattRapke
New Contributor II

Mine looks the same other than my measurement system is metric. The decimal symbol is definitely "." in my settings. 

Here is a link to my dummy survey with a single field with the decimal type:

https://survey123.arcgis.com/share/75ab1b17d7044948895cf174f7635b77 

Please let me know if you are able to enter a decimal number. Like I said, I can't get it to work on either of my computers. I have tried both Chrome and Edge browsers just in case. Both of them are stand-alone units, so there are no centralized IT settings that would be causing the issue. 

I did however just try it on my iPhone and it was able to enter the correct decimal value just fine.

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