CSPro Users Forum

Most of the problems we are facing here with our surveys are produced by the misuse of the Variable Tree. Interviewers want to be very "smart" and "dribble" the application, doing the application navigation by themselves. By doing that, sometimes they are provoking data inconsistencies, and worse, they are leaving crucial variables with notappl values (name and sex, for instance), no matter the checks we have in the postproc.
Sometime ago I asked for a new feature that would give us, developers, a way to inhibit showing this menu entry.
We really need that. From our point of view, the way we are using CSEntry, it is mandatory that the interviewers follow the regular variable flow. Of course, they can do some navigation by deciding which block to perform, and in which order, but we do not allow them to go to a specific variable inside a block.
Is there another way to guarantee that they use the application the way we want it?

You mean the case tree on the left side of the screen? You can disable that in the data entry options by setting "show case tree" to "never".

In our case the option is set as never, as in the attached figure.
But if the interviewer uses the menu button at the top right of the screen s/he can reach the case tree.
The left arrow also is a pain.
We would really like to inhibit these options in the menu.

Are you using "operator controlled" mode? That is really meant for key from paper. For CAPI (tablet/phone) you should use "system control" mode. In system control mode you can't leave fields blank (unless you specifically allow it) or work around consistency checks, even when using the case tree.

One of the reasons we use "operator controlled" is that the \n inside error messages does not work in "system controlled".
Even if we use "system controlled", the interviewer still can access the case tree, which we do not want them to.

Please try this.
set errmsg (operator);
errmsg ("First, finish partially saved cases.\n\nAfter that, you can start new interview.");
set errmsg(default);
Best.
a.

\n definitely works in errmsg in system control mode. I use it all the time.

Will look into a way to completely disable case tree.

yeah, \n works in operator controlled but NOT in system controlled.
If you can disable the case tree, think also about disabling the left navigator arrow. That is also a pain.

No. \n definitely works in system control mode. I use it all the time. If you have an app where it does not work please send it.

See attached.
It does not work in Version 7.1 (maybe it works in 7.2)