MindStick SurveyManager FAQ ?

FAQ Related To MindStick SurveyManager

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MindStick SurveyManager is a powerful easy to use software product which helps user to deploy ASP.NET web surveys in minutes, collect data and view results without writing any code. Our survey creating grid lets you design your survey and save that to a xml file. Then you can set this xml file as a property of or web control DLL which can be hosted in any existing ASPX web page or new page. Results of your surveys can be saved to a xml files and can be viewed in grid and chart format. Following are the highlights of MindStick SurveyManager:
  • Create a Web Survey, add questions, answer options and choose style without writing even one line of code.
  • Preview the created survey.
  • Host the survey in existing ASP.NET web form or create new one.
  • Choose the option to save the survey result in xml file.
  • Use MS SurveyManager Viewer to view the survey results in grid and chart format.
  • Use of Visual Studio is optional.

MindStick SurveyManager has following benefits:
  • No programming needed to create fully dynamic and powerful web surveys.
  • User can easily create and design survey according to their needs.
  • User can easily create form and add validations in it.
  • It reduces time as user needs not to write HTML and CSS code for each survey.
  • User can easily view survey results in grid and chart format by just browsing to the results xml file.

.Net Framework 3.5 or newer framework versions need to be installed on the machine.

No. MindStick SurveyManager is standalone software.

We can install and run MindStick Survey Manager application only on windows operating systems such as Microsoft Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7 etc.

Yes, user can run MindStick SurveyManager both in 32 and 64 bit of windows.

It is easy to create a web survey using our MS SurveyManager. Use the following steps :
Create a New Survey
Click the [New] button located on the top left of the MS SurveyManager to create the web survey.
Add Questions
Click the [Add Question] button in the application or select option from context menu available in both right panel and design panel. When the Add Question window opens, select the desired Question Type from the drop-down menu at the top of the page. This will display all of the appropriate text fields where user can customize the question text, answer choices, etc..
Customize your design
  1. Survey Design Options:
    In addition to being able to customize the questions and pages, user also has options to customize specific design options for the whole survey. User can find these settings in the [Style Settings] section of the Settings option.
  2. Form Template Option:
    Form Template Option You can also create a Form Template in your survey in order to take users information and it will display before the survey start or after the survey finished.
Saving the Survey
If user wants to save the survey, click on the Save button, It will open Save As dialog (when file is not saved) otherwise update the data if the file exists. If user wants to save the data in a new file click on Save As option, file will be saved with [.msd] extension.

Following steps need to be taken to create a question for the web survey :
  • Once a survey has been created, click the
    [+ Add Question]
    button.
  • Choose the question type from the drop-down menu of the question types.
  • Enter the text for the question and answer choices.
  • Click the Add Next or Done button to save it in the design.
Choose to add any of the following question types to the survey :
  • Multiple Choices (Select Any) : 
    Allows only one answer to be selected.
  • Multiple Choices (Select Many) : 
    Allows more than one answer to be selected.
  • Matrix (Select Any) : 
    Allows only One Answer per Row.
  • Matrix (Select Multiple) : 
    Allows multiple answers per row.
  • Drop-down menus : 
    Presents drop-down menus.
  • Single Row Text : 
    Enter responses into a textbox.
  • Multiple Row Text : 
    Enter responses into a textarea.

To customize the design of the survey :
  1. Go to Settings.
  2. In Style Settings section, customize the survey design by options available in Select Options field.
  3. Apply & Save the changes.

Default Form Template :
In this form template user can select only default fields
(like First Name, Middle Name, Last Name etc...)
provided by the application. User cannot add or move the fields in Default Form Template. User can also copy fields into Custom Form Template by using Copy to Custom option.
Custom Form Template :
In this form template no default fields are provided. User can add new fields, move and delete fields according to the requirements. In custom form template user can enter field names, values and validations.

Go to the Display Form Option in Form Template Tab in Settings and choose the option according to the requirements. If user wants to display custom template form in the last of the Survey then After Survey option can be selected otherwise default selection will be always be Before survey.

Follow the steps to put custom expression validations :
  • Click Validations button of the selected field.
  • Select Custom Expression option from the Validation Dialog.
  • When the custom expression textbox is enabled, enter your expression. For e.g. (^\d{5}$)|(^\d{5}-\d{4}$).
  • Click on OK

Yes, user can have custom web form (Example - Collect user information) without any questions in their survey.

After completing the design process user has two options to publish the survey :
  • Use MindStick.Controls.Survey.dll with the existing ASPX web page, or
  • Use our MindStickSurveyPage.aspx web page which already refers to MindStick.Controls.Survey.dll
If user decides to use MindStick.Controls.Survey.dll then following three steps are needed :
Step 1 : Add Dll in asp.net web application (MindStick.Controls.Survey.dll).
Step 2: Save the survey file (.msd) to the desired location accessible to the website user.
Step 3: Add the Survey Control in web form, then pass the survey file in the property [Survey File (.msd)] and set xml file path in the property [SurveyDataFile] order to display survey and saving the result. Web site user should have write rights on the location where ever xml file is located.

If user decides to use MindStickSurveyPage.aspx then following four steps are needed :
Step 1: Add MindStickSurveyPage.aspx in existing or new asp.net web application.
Step 2: Add (MindStick.Controls.Survey.dll) in the bin folder of the asp.net web application.
Step 3: Save the survey file (.msd) to the desired location accessible to the website user.
Step 4: Pass the survey file in the property [Survey File (.msd)] and set xml file path in the property [SurveyDataFile] order to display survey and saving the result. Web site user should have write rights on the location where ever xml file is located.

Follow the steps to add MindStick Survey Control (MindStick.Controls.Survey.dll) in toolbox :
Step 1: Right click on toolbox in the left pane of Visual Studio.
Step 2: Select Choose Items.
Step 3: Browse and select Dll (MindStick.Controls.Survey.dll) to add it.

Web survey results can be viewed at anytime as the data is being collected in xml file. Web survey results are visible in the grid and chart format inside MS SurveyManager :
Step 1: Select [View Result] option in MS SurveyManager. Step 2: Pass the xml file path in survey data file dialog. User can also pass http path in Survey Data File dialog. If http file path is passed then user can synchronize the data from the pointed web server.

When user passes the xml file in the view result window, data will be displayed for both questions and answers. In Question section when user clicks on" View Replies" button for particular question, it will display the question replies in grid and chart format. The chart format is not visible if question type is Single or Multiple Row Text.

Yes, user can edit survey after collecting responses. In this case user will get responses of edited survey. We would recommend providing a new data xml file path so that user can view the new results without facing any issues. If changes in the questions were minor just like text of the question, then you do not need to provide new data xml file path.

User ID can be saved if the User ID is being set in the session field. In this session field name needs to be passed in the property [SessionUserIdField] of the survey control.

To rename the survey :
  1. Go to Settings.
  2. In the Edit Survey Details section, edit survey name.
  3. Apply the changes.

In order to apply default style :
  1. Go to Settings.
  2. Select Apply Default tab.
  3. Select “Default Style Setting” option. This option enabled only when default styles were not applied.
  4. Apply & Save the changes.

Omit blank page options allows user to remove the entire page no’s that contains no questions (Blank Pages) from the preview section only.

To change the sequence of the pages user can drag one page label and drop on top of another page label in the right panel which contains all questions within pages labels. If user moves page from top to bottom it will be added below the bottom page and if user moves from bottom to top, then it will be added above the top page.

User can drag question from the right panel and drop into another page of the right panel or edit the question and change the page number of that question. Optionally user can right click on the question in the right panel and select Move to – Page – [Page No].

To add the page in between the pages:
  1. Right click on the page in right panel where adding a page is desired.
  2. Select Add New Page -- select Up if it needs to be added above the page and select Down to add below the page.

Enter Values option is enabled only when user selects the control type like Dropdown, Radio Button, and Checkbox. User has to enter values which are displayed as options in these types of controls.

This option is always enabled except in the case when control type is Checkbox selected. User can add validations in the field by selecting Validations option.

Answer Required option validates the question and make the answer mandatory for that question.

In Matrix (Select Any) multiple groups of Radio buttons are added, it allows user to select only one answer per row, while In Matrix (Select Multiple) multiple groups of Checkboxes are added, it allows user to select multiple answers per row.

Max Length option will be visible only in case of Single Row Text question type which allows to set max length allowed by the user in the textbox.

To edit a survey :
  1. Open existing file in an application.
  2. Edit or modify the values according to your need.
  3. Save the changes.

To apply default settings of an application :
  1. Go to Settings.
  2. Select Apply Default tab.
  3. Select Apply Default Settings option.
  4. Apply and Save the changes.

Default Settings option contains :
  1. Application provides notification while user tries to delete a page or a question.
  2. Application resets “Omit Blank Page” state to unchecked state, if user had previously changed it to checked state.

Yes.

Yes.