Setting the date field to today sets the date without user interaction

9418
32
06-10-2021 01:52 PM
BenWalker1
New Contributor III

If I have a field, like a survey creation date, it should possible to set it to be today's date without the user needing to open a separate dialog box and then confirm todays date. this will reduce the number of clicks the users needs to have with the form. 

Tags (1)
32 Comments
RobertKacir

This could be achieved through editor tracking already present as functionality in ESRI geodatabases and ArcGIS Online hosted feature layers.

SteveOwens

You can make the it default to today's date by typing "now()" in the calculation column of the XLS form, see attached screenshot. Hope this helps.

SteveOwens_0-1623358909862.png

BenWalker1

We could use edit tracking, but I expect that sometimes a date in the past might need to be entered. So the primary use case is to use today's date, but sometimes a user might need to put the day before. 

DougMorgenthaler
Status changed to: Under Consideration
 
JonathanMcDougall

@SteveOwens 

Always nice to know, but we're talking Field Maps not Survey123.

 

@BenWalker1 

The use of dates has always frustrated me, everything from 1869 or 1899 onwards! Having a very simple auto-populated field, visible to the user when the inspection is being carried out, without the need to confirm it, would be so helpful. New Inspection - date/time populated in the desired field.

Fully appreciate the use of dates through edit tracking, but can get a wee bit messy when trying to spatially represent and symbolise a relationship class through a join.

ReinhardtBotha

This would be a great feature to have.

TylerBragg2

I'd like to see this feature as well.  I have a date field with conditional visibility based on a "status" field.  When the user updates the status field to "Closed", they must enter the "date closed", and I would like for the date field to auto-populate based on today's date so they don't have to select it manually.  

BrittanyBurson

Agreed! Would love to see this. Always looking to reduce the number of taps required. 

HillarySherrill

How it stands, it is too many clicks.  I support this change as well!

nspittlemeister_LCFPD

In my opinion, this needed to happen yesterday! Would be great functionality to have and would save our field users a lot of time.