What's new in ArcGIS Survey123 (November 2023)
We are excited to announce our November 2023 update to ArcGIS Survey123. This release includes exciting new features and enhancements:
- Better multilingual survey support
- More flexible visibility rules in the web designer
- Other enhancements and fixes
Preliminary notes
Before describing the details of what's new in this release, I wanted to share some basic info to help you get your Survey123 deployment up to date. To avoid undesired issues, it is always best to keep the different components of Survey123 updated!
- Survey123 website (includes the web designer): We upgrade the Survey123 website for you. The next time you log into survey123.arcgis.com you will be using the latest and greatest version of it. In this release, we upgraded the ArcGIS Maps SDK for JavaScript version used by the website to 4.27. This has resulted in better support for map symbology used in your survey layers, a new fresh look to the data table view and a bunch of functional and security fixes. If you are running a local copy of the Survey123 website, we will refresh the installer in MyEsri in the next coming weeks.
- Survey123 web forms: New enhancements and fixes to Survey123 web forms will likely not take effect unless you upgrade your forms. This is because web forms in Survey123 are version-locked by default. Check this blog to learn more about version locking and how to upgrade your surveys. In most cases, you can upgrade your surveys by simply republishing them.
- Survey123 Connect: The latest version of Survey123 Connect is 3.19. It is hard to believe how many of you are running old versions of Survey123 Connect! It is highly recommended that you upgrade the version of Survey123 Connect. Otherwise, you cannot take advantage of the latest features in the software in either the mobile or web apps. The latest version of Survey123 Connect can be downloaded from the Microsoft App Store. Alternatively, you can also access the Windows installer directly from this link. Unless you have a very old version of Survey123 Connect, you do not need to uninstall Connect before installing the latest version. But even if you do, uninstalling Connect will not cause any loss of existing designs or data.
- Survey123 XLSForm templates: The Survey123 Advanced and Basic XLSForm templates are upgraded with every Survey123 Connect release. Updates may include new question types, appearances, etc. The new templates will be available for new surveys but any existing surveys will not get the XLSForm files automatically upgraded to the latest template. You can however use the new 'Update XLSForm template' tool in Survey123 Connect to upgrade your XLSForm templates in existing surveys. If you do not see the Tools option in Connect, make sure you are running the latest version of Survey123 Connect and check this help topic.
- Survey123 Reports: The Survey123 report service is hosted in ArcGIS Online and is upgraded automatically. You do not have to do anything to take advantage of new features and fixes.
- Survey123 Connectors for Make.com and Microsoft Power Automate: Updates are applied automatically.
- Survey123 Mobile app: Available in the Apple, Google Play and Microsoft stores. The latest version is 3.19.114. Make sure everyone is current on it!
OK. With that, lets review the highlights of this release...
Better multilingual survey support
Did you know you can author Survey123 forms in multiple languages? This makes your forms more effective, allowing respondents to read and interact with your survey in the language of their choice.
If you are new to multilingual survey design, it is not too late to learn:
- This 2-minute video describes multilingual support in Survey123 web designer
- If you are interested in Survey123 Connect, check this Esri Community blog
More languages available in the Survey123 web designer
As the following animation shows, adding a new language to your survey design is straightforward.
Up until this release, you could use the Survey123 web designer to translate your surveys into Arabic, Bosnian, Bulgarian, Catalan, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Portuguese (Portugal), Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Simplified Chinese, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Traditional Chinese (Taiwan), Traditional Chinese (Hong Kong), Turkish, Ukrainian, and Vietnamese.
With this update, we added support for dozens of additional languages including Aymara, Creole, Chamorro, Esperanto, Islandic, Irish, Kurdish, Macedonian, Navajo, Nepali, Pasto, Quechua, Sanskrit, Scottish Gaelic, Swahili, Tamil, Tonga, Urdu, Welsh, Zulu and many more!
Translation export and import tools in Survey123 Connect
Earlier this year we introduced export and import tools for your translations in the Survey123 web designer. The export and import tools are useful when you want someone else to take care of the translation: You export your survey design into a spreadsheet, someone else translates it, and then you import the file back into Survey123 web designer.
With this update, the survey translation export and import tools are now also available in Survey123 Connect.
Simply open the Tools menu in Survey123 Connect, and you will see the export and import options. If the Tools menu is not present, make sure you have the latest version of Survey123 Connect installed and check this help topic.
Visibility rules in the Survey123 web designer
Use the Survey123 web designer to visually author your own smart forms. This update introduces changes to how you set visibility rules for questions and groups. The new experience is more flexible, allowing you to define more sophisticated rules. A new, easy-to-use expression builder lets you configure one or multiple criteria to build your conditional visibility logic.
Most importantly, you can now set visibility rules for all question types and groups in your design.
To set visibility rules, first click on a question. Then, scroll down to the Behavior section and build your rule combining one or more expressions.
Other enhancements and fixes
Offline support for location sharing in the mobile app
Earlier in the year, support for the location sharing ArcGIS capability was added into the Survey123 mobile app. Use location sharing to monitor the last known location of your mobile users and understand where they have been. Read the Deploy a Location Sharing solution with ArcGIS Survey123 paper for more details.
In this update, the location sharing widget in the Survey123 mobile app can display tracks even while offline.
Custom locator support in the mobile app
Either using the Survey123 web designer or XLSForm, you can now specify what locator should be used in your survey maps. This allows you to better configure the geosearch experience within your form.
The following example illustrates how you can configure a geopoint question to use a specific locator using XLSForm. Note that the geocode property specifies the item ID of the locator to be used in the map question.
Audio question type enhancements in the web designer
You can now configure the audio question in the web designer to either allow audio recording, audio file browsing, or both.
Fixes
ArcGIS Survey123 Connect and mobile app
- BUG-000159382 - Unable to scan QR codes with ArcGIS Survey123 app on Windows.
- BUG-000146166 - In ArcGIS Survey123 on Microsoft Windows, when being prompted to take a picture in the survey, the rear camera view is flipped horizontally.
- BUG-000158617 - The "Where" clause is optional in a pulldata(“@layer”) function in the ArcGIS Survey123 app, but it is obligatory for getValue and getRecord.
- BUG-000159544 - In the ArcGIS Survey123 field app, the pulldata("@layer") response caching causes submission errors, "Layer '' not found in the feature service."
- BUG-000156244 - Unable to view address suggestions in the ArcGIS Survey123 app if the associated geocode service is shared with the owner or organization.
- BUG-000162405 - The 'Analyze survey' tool in ArcGIS Survey123 Connect does not work and returns the error message, "TypeError: argument of type 'int' is not iterable" when a number is used in the calculation column.
- BUG-000159313 - ArcGIS Survey123 Connect dialogs are cut off with a high display scale in the display settings in Windows.
- ENH-000159248 - Enhance Survey123 to allow alternative ways to capture photos when using in-app camera (tap and hold on the screen to take a photo)
- ENH-000141178 - Allow Anonymous users to access public custom locators in the geopoint questions of publicly shared Survey123 forms
- ENH-000122540 - Allow custom ArcGIS Online locators to be accessible by users that are not in the organization.
Website
- ENH-000155022 - All question types in the Survey123 web designer now support being hidden
- BUG-000157151 - The Survey123 website returns the error message, "The survey is not accessible or does not exist" when a survey form is selected from the My Surveys tab before the Records count values populates the surveys with a view layer as the submission URL
- BUG-000151933 - In the ArcGIS Survey123 website, the surveys count number in the Overview tab is incorrect when applying a date range
- BUG-000161232 - The dynamic list in the second drop-down question is not displayed in the ArcGIS Survey123 mobile app (iOS and Android)
Web app
- BUG-000101568 - The Survey123 web app does not honor rules when users switch the answer to the first question within the rule after already answering other questions that fall under that rule
- BUG-000121994 - Survey123 web app fails to hide questions once they are exposed by a rule when the answer is changed to hide the questions
- BUG-000156286 - In ArcGIS Survey123, the map in a geoshape question does not load when the question is in a repeat and the default column is set to null
- BUG-000160874 - When a survey contains a group with the table-list appearance and a note or text is the following question, the error message "The survey does not exist or is not accessible" is returned on the ArcGIS Survey123 website.
- ENH-000161255 - When opening the Survey123 web app with a submitted record in the view mode ?mode=view&globalId=, a user should be able to download attachment files for image, file and audio question types
Report service
- BUG-000161915 - A feature report is failing when trying to generate from the ArcGIS Survey123 website with an "Internal server-side error" due to a lack of memory.
Check the Survey123 What's new Help Topic for more information, including information about this and earlier updates.
What's coming next
We are working towards an update for early 2024. We will shortly announce new features planned in this upcoming release through the Survey123 Early Adopter website