LimeSurvey authorized partners from Argentina, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, and the Netherlands introduced the services they offer (for example: support, installation, survey creation, customization, theme design, and training) and some of their very complex or very big survey projects done in the past.There was a hands-on demonstration of the new features of the upcoming LimeSurvey version 4, that you can already check out on https://devdemo.limesurvey.org. You can also try it out by downloading the development version from https://www.limesurvey.org/development-release. LimeSurvey 4 will be a huge step forward and will include many improvements both in the administration backend (where you will find among other features an integrated question preview and updated text editor), as well as performance improvement under the hood. Question themes, modules, and user roles are just a few of the highlights. Regarding the future development of LimeSurvey, founder and CTO Carsten Schmitz and the new CEO, Sebastian Wendrich stressed that LimeSurvey will forever remain free and open source.Details about the upcoming LimeStore were presented. LimeStore is the first place to visit when you are looking for extensions like plugins or themes. Even though LimeStore is still marked as beta, you can use it already to get access to plenty of free extensions, as well as extensions that can be unlocked by purchasing a Premium package (such as the 2-Factor-Authentication plugin developed by LimeSurvey GmbH). It will continue to grow and expand to cover the most diversified needs of the users.But besides all the fruitful discussions, interesting presentations, and insights into the further development of LimeSurvey, the LimeCon also was fun and helped to change the perspective on some issues. Did  it help? Well, there is only one way to check that - follow us on one of the following social media channels to learn about the latest developments: Facebook Twitter Instagram Reddit Mastodon Xing LinkedIn

To download the RC2 of LimeSurvey 4, click here. You can also access the live RC2 release of LimeSurvey 4 here. The new question editor panel A new question editor has been implemented (based on CKEditor 5 and VueJS 2). A script editor has also been added to help users increase the complexity of their surveys by entering JavaScript, HTML or CSS code. In terms of question attributes, you will see only the general ones next to the question and help text boxes. All the other question attributes have been moved below the text boxes, being located next to the subquestion and answer option menus. Together with the live preview feature, users can now see how the edits impact the question design live. Global & group survey settings In LimeSurvey 4 you can edit the survey settings at the global and group level. The participant and publication & access settings, presentation information, and notifications can be easily set up from the global and survey group menu: The inheritance level works in the following way: Global settings -> Survey group settings -> Survey settings Any change done in one of the upper levels will immediately be inherited by the survey as long as the inheritance attribute is activated. New file management system The panel for resource management has been replaced with a file management system that provides a complete overview of the files and folders from your instance. The ability to copy and move files from one place to another has also been implemented. Data encryption Data encryption is a new feature provided in LimeSurvey 4. It has been created to help survey administrators better cope with the new data-protection regulations adopted in different parts of the world (e.g., GDPR or HIPAA). This new capability permits the encryption of personal data located in the central participant database and/or survey participants table. Moreover, you can also encrypt the data you collect from your respondents if the encryption question attribute is enabled. User management panel and user roles The user management panel has been completely redone offering you the possibility to add dummy users, as well as importing/exporting users from other LimeSurvey instances. However, the biggest news is the appearance of roles – now you can simply create roles within your organisations (e.g., students, professors, research), and easily provide user groups the same role, which in turn assigns to each user group the same set of global permissions.   What is missing? At the moment, the “question themes” feature is being integrated into the GUI. It will be much easier to add customized questions into your instance - you will be no longer limited to the default question types. In the meantime, we are also working at the development of our LimeStore - a market for plugins, themes, and question themes created by our community members. For more information, access the LimeStore page. Testing and testing! We are getting closer to the release of the first stable version of LimeSurvey 4. To fasten the process, join us in testing RC2 and report the potential issues on our bugs tracker. If you have questions about LimeSurvey 4 or you just simply want to show the gratitude to the community and developers who contributed to this release, join our forum discussion topic here.

The LimeSurvey project will be attending the ReMoDel event in Italy/Padua. Althought the final date of the workshop is not set yet we are happy that we will be a part of this event. There will be also a four hour LimeSurvey workshop where you can explore the secrets of LimeSurvey under professional guidance. The aim of the ReMoDel workshop is to bring developers of open source survey software together with practitioners, researchers and users of survey software in order to discuss common problems and plan the way forward. The workshop will consist of a conference and some short courses. The conference will consist of an introductory session and a number of plenary sessions. Each plenary session will consist of an introductory presentation and two other presentations about the issue of the session. The presentations will take up no more than half the time of the session, so to leave room for discussion among the participants. Care will be taken that presentations may be understood by all attendees, so they should not be overly technical. Two or more short courses will be held, too, on the topical issue. The courses will last half a day and will be held before the conference. Separate courses may be held in different languages, so to favour participation. Do not miss this chance to meet survey developers and professional users. If you would like to get more information visit the ReMoDel page and/or register with the official ReMoDel mailing list.