Surveys
Collect field data with a themed form that writes straight into a live feature layer — respondents only need a link, not an account.
The builder#
The survey editor shows the question palette and question list on the left, a live preview of the themed form in the middle, and the inspector for the selected question on the right. The header carries the survey’s status pill — Draft, Live or Closed — and the Questions and Results tabs (Results appears once the survey is published). Drag questions to reorder; everything autosaves.
The nine question types#
| Type | Notes |
|---|---|
| Text | A single line. |
| Paragraph | Longer free text. |
| Choice | Options one per line; allow multiple selections; show as dropdown. |
| Yes / No | A binary choice. |
| Number | With optional minimum and maximum. |
| Rating | A star scale from 2 to 10. |
| Date | A date. |
| Date & time | A date with clock time. |
| Location | A point on a map — see below. At most one per survey. |
Every question has a label, optional help text and a Required toggle. Questions can also be conditional: show only when a previous answer matches a value of an earlier Choice or Yes/No question.
The location question#
Respondents answer via map only (click to set the point), address search only, or search and map together, with a use-my-location button. The map background is a built-in basemap or one of your org’s web maps. The answer becomes the response layer’s point geometry.
Where responses land#
Publishing a survey creates a real dataset: “{survey title} — Responses” — a point feature layer if there’s a location question, otherwise a table. One column per question. Responses are ordinary OrbGIS data: render them on maps, open them in the feature table, chart them in dashboards. Column names are fixed at publish time; you can keep editing wording and add new questions afterwards (new questions go live with an explicit Publish N new questions).
Publishing — two stages#
- Publish survey (Editor role or higher) — creates the response dataset and an organization fill link any signed-in member can use. Status becomes Live.
- Publish to web (Publisher or Admin) — an anonymous public form at
your-org.orbgis.se/your-survey, with a QR code. Unpublish the web form at any time without closing the survey.
A live survey can be closed (submissions rejected, data kept) and reopened later. Survey settings hold a rich-text intro, the thank-you message and a soft one-response-per-person limit.
Watching results#
The Results tab shows a live response count, a paged table of answers, a link to open the response layer itself, and — when there’s a location question — a mini-map of the latest response points. It refreshes in real time as responses arrive.