Initial Setup for Exporting Data

 To export data from a survey:

1. With the survey open, go to the Survey Data > Exports menu command.

The first stage of the Export dialog opens - .



Figure 1 - The first stage of the Export dialog

The information displayed, and the options available, are as follows:

• Survey Id - the identification number of the survey you are currently working on.
• Active Database - the currently selected database. To change this, go to the Database selection field in the lower-right corner of the window.
• Format - the format in which the file is to be exported. Note that the dialog displayed will differ depending on the format you select here.

Note: When exporting to Excel, if you intend to re-import the data that is to be exported then you should choose ‘Excel File’ not ‘Excel File (Answer Codes as Labels)’. This is because you cannot import the data if it’s in the format ‘Answer Codes as Labels’.

• Interview Status Filter - lists all the statuses the survey can have. Check the appropriate boxes to include the data from all respondents who have that status.
• Expression - this field allows you to generate filtered data exports. For example, say you would like to export only female records. Assuming you had a question in the survey “What is your gender?”, with the answer options Male=1 and Female=2, you can generate an expression such as gender="2". This would filter out only female records when using the Survey Data Export.
• Date Filter - you can choose to include in the export file only the respondent data that has been entered into the database within a specified date range. To do so, check the box to activate the functionality, then type in or select the Start Date and End Date for the required period.
• Relative Date Filter - allows you to export data from different time intervals relative to the scheduled export time. This is useful when data exports are run as recurring tasks.
• Data to be included - Once a respondent has replied to a survey and that response data has been included in an export file, that data will in many cases not change. For recurring data exports, much of the data exported will therefore merely be a repeat of earlier exports. This option allows you to select whether you wish to export all the available data or only those records that have been added or modified since the previous data export task.
2. Select the required format for the export. Note that the options available will depend on the format selected here.
3. Select the interview statuses that are to be included.
4. If you want to specify a date range for the data, check the Date Filter box and select the desired dates.
5. Click Next.

The second stage of the Export dialog opens. Note that the options available in the dialog will depend on the export format you have selected.

• Excel
• Excel File (Answer Codes as Labels)
• Delimited Text File
• Delimited Text File (Answer Codes as Labels)
• Forsta Extended Triple-S XML file
• Triple-S XML (Standard)
• SPSS
• Quantum
• SAS file
• Fixed width file

Relative Date Filter

The Relative date filter allows you to export data from different time intervals relative to the scheduled export time. This is useful when data exports are run as recurring tasks.

For example. If a task is set to run every Monday at 00:01, and you want to export data from the last month, you can set up the export task with these "relative" settings:

• Interval start:
• Months = 1.
• Days = (not specified).
• Hours = (not specified).
• Minutes = (not specified).
• Interval end:
• Months = (not specified).
• Days = (not specified).
• Hours = (not specified).
• Minutes = (not specified).

A more complex example could be:

Let us assume that a data export has been scheduled to run at a specific time N, and the user wants to receive data for an interval:

• Start = N - (2 months + 3 days)
• End = N - (1 month + 5 hours + 30 minutes)

The interval length will be as follows:

(2 months + 3 days) - (1 months + 5 hours + 30 minutes) = (1 months + 2 days + 18 hours + 30 minutes).

To perform a data export for the above-mentioned interval, enter the following specifications in export properties:

• Interval start:
• Months = 2.
• Days = 3.
• Hours = (not specified).
• Minutes = (not specified).
• Interval end:
• Months = 1.
• Days = (not specified).
• Hours = 5.
• Minutes = 30.

Note: When the source is a survey database the Relative Date filter is based on Interview Start, while for a Respondent database it is based on the system variable CreatedDate.