Hello,
I have found an error in an active survey in which a question type is incorrect (it is currently a list-type question where respondents can only select one answer, but it needs to be a multiple choice type question where they can select multiple correct options). The only way I know to fix this is to download the existing responses and save them, and then deactivate the survey, correct the error, and then reactivate the survey. There are two versions of this survey that need correcting:

1) an anonymous version that does NOT use tokens, but which allows respondents to save their answers and return; and
2) an anonymous version that DOES use tokens, and which allows token-based response persistence

I would like to correct the error in this question, but I don't want to remove the ability of participants with partial responses to continue the survey. I was hoping someone could explain to me what will happen to the partial responses if I deactivate and then reactivate the survey, and hopefully tell me how I can preserve the partial responses while also editing the flawed question?

Thanks in advance for your time and your help!

Hi,

1st : alway do a backup before : export to survey archive (LSA°
2nd : deactivate survey
3rd : update your survey
4rth : activate survey
5th : go to token and get the old table
6th go to response, click on menu "Import responses from a deactivated survey table" and get the old table

You lost the answer done on the updated question, not other answers.

Thanks for the response, DenisChenu. So if I understand correctly, the people with partially completed responses will lose their answers to the one corrected question, but not the others (and I will have a copy of their responses because I've backed it up). Is that true also for the survey that is just anonymous and does not use tokens?

I did think that one could restore old responses to a survey, but the one other time I had to do this I was unable to restore the old responses. I don't remember why, or if I even knew why, I just know that I was unable to do it---I think they just didn't show up as an option? It was ok in the sense that I had backed up the responses and was able to merge them after the survey was over, but I was never able to get them into the table in the updated survey within limesurvey itself.

cwyn wrote: ...
Is that true also for the survey that is just anonymous and does not use tokens?

It can never be true, even without deactivation. You NEED a token and not anonymmous enabled.

Not sure for "saved survey" manually : to be tested.

I did think that one could restore old responses to a survey, but the one other time I had to do this I was unable to restore the old responses. I don't remember why, or if I even knew why, I just know that I was unable to do it---I think they just didn't show up as an option? It was ok in the sense that I had backed up the responses and was able to merge them after the survey was over, but I was never able to get them into the table in the updated survey within limesurvey itself.

LimeSUrvey version ? There are a lot of uodate for this functionnality in 2.05 and 2.06.

Denis

Thanks again for the response DenisChenu. For the anonymous survey, participants can save responses and resume later. It is not clear to me what happens to these responses if I deactivate the survey, modify the problem question, and re-activate it. I presume that these partial responses would be lost? (For the anonymous survey, I have the option "Participant may save and resume later?" enabled, in the general survey settings.)

My limesurvey says 2.05+ at the bottom.

Hi,
I am having a similar issue and I'm not quite sure what will happen with an anonymous survey - will the partially completed responses be lost once I deactivate my survey?
My LimeSurvey says 2.00+ at the bottom.
Thanks.

First of all: If you still need any response of the survey, do not deactivate the survey, because this means that all responses are removed and written into a different table. They usually still accesible, but it is a lot more complicated (no matter of complete or incomplete, this is true for all responses). So always just "expire" the survey. "Deactivating" is basically more like "archiving".

Thanks for getting back to me holch. From what I'm reading, it says that I cannot add a question if I simply expire the survey... is there a way around this?

This is correct and I don't see a way around it. But there are some ways to get answers from a deactivated survey back into the system. However, I am not sure how this works (there are some explanations here in the forum) and if it works in all circumstances.

Before you do anything, I would backup the survey and also I would download the responses so far as CSV. Just to make sure you have them secured. Because if you can't get them back into the survey after making the changes, at least you can later merge the resultsdatabases somehow.