To pause a running survey you need to deactivate it and then to reactivated it and reimport the results. A new database table is created.
The old is renamed.

A Pause/Maintenance function per survey and installation wide
with the option to display a text would be a solution.

You can use Start date/time: in the future to do that option.

I think it's good.


PS: good idea the new forum, but what for ideas.limesurvey.org ?

Your respondents will feel a bit taken for a ride if they read "Survey hasn't started" and you have invited them.
The aim is to drive more attention to ideas.limesurvey.org and link from here to the ideas and back from the ideas comment fields to threads here.

I think the discussions in one place is better. Perhaps the board software could mimic the ideas tracker features like voting in future. But the momentum is on the forum not on the comments on ideas.limesurvey.org

I agree with Jelo, the start/end date might work, but it is not good for new users (not intuitive) and it is not the right feature, which might cause misunderstandings for the survey takers.

I second his request.

Also I would go a step further and change the "deactivate" function. Most people would not expect to disappear the results when they deactivate something. It is just not active anymore.

I also think the deactivation/survey timing feature might need some overworking. Instead of moving the data to a different table at deactivation we can think of keeping the data and setting an end date. When activating the survey again we can simply ask "Do you want to keep the current answer data table or create a new one?".

Please open an according idea ticket for your suggestion and link it here.