ArcGIS Survey123

Survey123 for ArcGIS 2.3 is now available

[Original source: Survey123 for ArcGIS GeoNet Group]

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We are pleased to announce the availability of Survey123 for ArcGIS 2.3 across all supported platforms. This update is for the most part a maintenance release but it introduces a handful of interesting features…

Before we start, a reminder to clear your browser cache! 

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 Custom branding for your forms in Survey123 Web Designer

The Survey123 Web Designer lets you easily create smart forms in ArcGIS using a graphical user experience. With every update we extend its functionality so you can build more and more sophisticated forms. Many of  you have requested better control over the look and feel of the survey.

With this update you can now add a custom header to your own surveys. The header can include rich text and even images.  This is a great  feature if you want to brand your surveys to fit the corporate colors and logo of  your organization or initiative.

On top of this, through the Web Designer’s Appearance tab you can also now toggle the survey description, footer and header as well as better control the font and content of your question hints through a Rich Text Editor control.

Last by not least, the new Note question type lets you add rich content anywhere within your form. You can add images, html links and much more. Notes are a great way to spice up your forms, but they are not just about the looks: Through notes you can include useful tips for users to properly complete the forms.

Open your Survey123 Connect forms in a web browser (Beta)

With this release, you can now open your surveys authored in Survey123 Connect for ArcGIS from a web browser. This is a feature that has been on the works since November 2016 and we feel it is pretty much complete at this moment.

Following a conservative approach, we have flagged this feature as Beta, but made it available to all of you from the Survey123 website.

To open your Survey123 Connect surveys from a web browser, open the Collaborate tab in the Survey123 website.  You will now always  find a survey link available, even if  your survey was published from Survey123 Connect for ArcGIS.

You can also launch your Survey123 Connect forms in your browser right from Survey123 Connect. Once published, you can open your survey in a web browser, through the button intermediately below the Publish in the Survey123 toolbar.

While the new Web Form can handle the vast majority of the XLSForm features supported by Survey123 Connect, there are some exceptions:

Other than the above, your web browser should  be able to handle anything you author in Survey123 Connect for ArcGIS: Groups, Repeats, Notes custom expressions in Constraints, Relevant and Calculation columns etc

There are some known issues and things to be aware at the moment:

If you find more issues, please report them through Esri Support Home. We are looking forward to refine the new Web Forms and move them away from Beta!

Custom Form Reports (Beta)

This is an experimental feature at the moment, but given how badly many of  you have  been asking for it we have brought it forward in Beta so you can try it out.

The basic requirement is to be able to generate a printable document out of the data submitted via Survey123 smart forms.  Ideally, one should have total control over the look and feel of the printed document: headers, footers, the map, tables, size of photos etc.

The approach we propose lets you author Form Report templates in Microsoft Word. Following a series of simple rules, you define placeholders in your Word document which our Survey123 report engine will replace with values from the forms submitted.  As the owner of a survey you can associate one or more Custom Form Report templates with a survey, which can be used later to either print specific surveys submitted, or may be to back-up the captured data digitally or on paper.   This workflow is conceptually close to Microsoft’s Office Mail Merge functionality, although the exact syntax is specific to Survey123.

I will describe briefly how to get going with this:

We are at the very beginnings of this, but you will get an idea of where we  want to go with it.  Note that you should be able to handle all types of questions  including photos, signatures and repeats.

Your feedback on this new  Beta feature is also welcomed!

Other fixes and enhancements

Survey123 website

Survey123 Connect 

Now available for download on Windows, Mac  and Linux. This update improves publishing of surveys against ArcGIS Server Enterprise feature services, particularly when these services have related tables.

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Note that  starting  with  this  version, any survey published  against ArcGIS Enterprise Hosted feature services using the ArcGIS Data Store must include all question names in lowercase. This is to ensure  that names of questions in your XLSForm match exactly feature  service field names in your feature service (The ArcGIS Data Store does not  support upper case characters in field names).

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When working against existing feature services (in ArcGIS Online or ArcGIS Enterprise), Survey123 Connect will validate at publishing time that all XLSForm question names perfectly match field names in your feature service.

Survey123 field app

Now available in the Apple, Amazon and Google Play stores.  Its build number is 2.3.29. The most  significant fixes include:

AppStudio for ArcGIS

The source code of version 2.3 for both the Survey123 field app and Survey123 Connect for ArcGIS has been made available in AppStudio for ArcGIS version 2.0

Next Steps

Our next release is planned for late August or early September. Our focus continues to be focusing on quality improvements as well as:

We update  our builds  of Survey123 in the Early Adopter  Program nearly every Friday, in case that you want to test new features coming up.

For more details on What is New in this, and prior releases, check out our What is New help topic.

About the author

Ismael Chivite joined Esri in 2002. A geographer by training, he loves helping people leverage GIS to improve the way they work. As a Senior Product Manager, Ismael is always looking for ideas to create new and improve existing Esri products. Outside working hours: Legos, rock climbing, Romanesque architecture and jamon iberico. On occasion, he enjoys jamon during working hours too.

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