Part II: Collect Data with Gather--View and Manage the Data

Version 515

View Data Recorded From Your Form

Now you will take a look at the data your form generated to see if it looks correct. You want to make sure that that the data transmitted by the form to the Gather program is what you expect and that the responses you got from your selections are proper. Are the responses attributed to the correct field names? Are the fields ordered in the output as you intended?

1. Access the data from the Gather program from the Gather home page or enter the URL http://cgi.haverford.edu/acc/gather/gather515?Action=ListForms in your browser. Make a bookmark for the data access page, which will then appear under the title Select Forms by Owner in your bookmarks menu.
2. Type in your email username, and make sure haverford.edu (or whatever the hostname is of your email account) appears as the hostname.
   
3. Click on the button called NewRequestListForms to get a list of the forms you own.
4. You get a new form to select the data you want.
   
5. Select the form for which you want to see data, if you have multiple forms.
6. Select the output format you want to use. For this exercise, choose tab (open Excel). Below are the formats you are most likely to use:
   
   • Table X or Table Y = a table that you view in a browser window, with the field names in the first row (X) or column (Y). This is only useful to have a quick look at the data. If you want to be able to view a lot of records, or to manipulate the data, you'll need to download the data to your computer and bring it into another program, as described below.
   • tab (open Excel) = this option will send the data to your computer in tab-delimited format (field values separated by tabs, records separated by a carriage return) and then open Excel to display it. You can then manipulate the data in Excel and save it as a worksheet.
   • tab (download) = will create a file in tab-delimited format (see above) that will be downloaded to your own computer. Tab-delimited data can be imported easily into most database, spreadsheet and statistical programs.
7. In the field named Enter Password, enter your email password.
8. Click Display to display or download your data in the output format you selected.
9. Your data should open in a new worksheet in Microsoft Excel. If Excel brings up a dialog box asking "What do you want to do with this file?", select the default "Open it". If your browser attempts to download the data instead of displaying it in Excel, you may need to change the the action for "Microsoft Excel Worksheet" in the preferences of your browser.
10. You may want to make some adjustments to your data in Excel, e.g., widen some of the columns, delete the "Submit" column, sort by a particular field. Be sure to save your worksheet. 
11. If you discovered any problems in your form when you entered the test data or checked the output, go back to your form and correct the errors.

You can download your data as often as you like. You can, however, delete all or some of the existing data associated with your form. This can be useful when you want to remove test data before making the form available. You will learn how to remove form data in the Form Maintenance section below. Remember that any changes you make in your spreadsheet or other format of downloaded data will not occur in the original data which is still on the Gather server. That is, if you delete duplicate records or unneeded columns in Excel, the data will still be there when you download the data again, as will all of the data you have downloaded previously.

Advanced Form Maintenance Options

In addition Gather also allows you to set access to rights to your data, perform simple maintenance on data and forms, and set data validation rules. To use these advanced options, you must create a web account (once) and log in.

Create a Web Account and Log in

To use the advanced features of Gather, you must use a special web account rather than your Haverford email account. You must first create your own web account. This web account uses the same username as your email account, but you will choose a new password for it. Once you have created your web account, you will log into this account before you access data from your web forms. The account will stay active for several hours, or until you quit your web browser. When you log into your web account you do not have to enter your password each time you want to access data from one of your forms.

(Note that the web password only works with data created from forms using Gather version 511 or higher; if you need to access data from forms created with earlier versions of the Gather program, you must log out of your web account and use your regular email password.)

To create a new web account:

1. Follow the link to Create HC Web account or log into existing account from the Gather home page you bookmarked.   Alternatively, enter the URL http://cgi.haverford.edu/acc/gather/access in your browser. Make a bookmark for the data access page, which will then appear under the title HC Web Services Access Control in your bookmarks menu.
2. In the pop-up menu titled Select an Option, choose New Users can request a HC Web Services userid and password and click on the Continue button.
   
3. Enter your full email address, e.g., juser@haverford.edu .
4. Enter your Eudora password where prompted.
5. Then choose a new password for your web account, and enter it in the last two spaces, as prompted.
6. Click the Submit button.

Note that if you choose a password for your web account that is the same as your Eudora password, it will remain a separate account. When you change your Eudora password, you will have to change your web password separately. If you forget your web password, you can reset it yourself using your Eudora password to identify yourself. Resetting your web account password is one of the options in the pop-up menu on the Create HC Web account or log into existing account page.

Once you have created a web account, you will log into it whenever you want to use advanced features or access data from your web forms.

Log into an Existing Web Account:

1. Select the bookmark HC Web Services Access Control that you created, or follow the link to Create HC Web account or log into existing account from the Gather home page.
2. In the pop-up menu titled Select an Option, choose Login with your HC Web services userid and password and click on the Continue button.
3. Enter your full username including the @haverford.edu, and enter your web account password. Click the Login button.

Once you have logged, you can access the advanced options using the procedure below.

1. Access the data from the Gather program from the Gather home page or enter the URL http://cgi.haverford.edu/acc/gather/gather515?Action=ListForms in your browser. Make a bookmark for the data access page, which will then appear under the title Select Forms by Owner in your bookmarks menu.
2. Type in your email username, and make sure haverford.edu (or whatever the hostname is of your email account) appears as the hostname.
   
3. Click on the button called NewRequestListForms to get a list of the forms you own.
4. You get a new form to select the data you want. Make sure that you see a note that "You are currently logged in as ..." at the top of your screen. If not, you need to
   
5. You now see the following advanced options menu. Each option is explained below.
   

Set a General Password for Your Data Set--GetResourcePass

Sometimes you may collaborate on research projects. Only one person can "own" the data collected with Gather, but several people may need to access the data. If you want other people to have access to the data from your form , you can set a special "sharing password" for your data. DO NOT GIVE OUT YOUR EMAIL PASSWORD. To set a sharing password:

1. Go to the Advanced Form Maintenance Options as described above.
2. Click on the GetResourcePass button. You see the form illustrated below.
   
3. You can ignore the first box. Your email password is not required.
4. When asked to "Select sharing password type", keep the default "RO" for read-only, rather than "RW" for read-write.
5. Next you must "Enter the sharing password you want to set. Enter any password you wish to give out to others requiring access to your data. This should not be the same as your email password.
6. Click on the UpdateResourcePass button.
7. Ask someone else to try to access your form data. They will need to go to Select Forms by Owner page. They will enter your username as the Form Owner, but will enter the sharing password rather than your email password when prompted on the second screen for a password. If you have multiple forms, remember that the sharing password will only work for the particular form for which you set it.

Set Specific User Access Rights--ListAccess

In addition to setting a general password for anyone requiring access to the form data, you can set specific access rights for individuals using the ListAccess feature.

1. Go to the Advanced Form Maintenance Options as described above.
2. Click on the ListAccess button. You see the form illustrated below.
   
3. Click on the Add User link and enter the requested information for each person are allowing to access your form data.
4. For each user, check the access privileges you wish to grant and click the Save button.
   
5. These users can then see your form information first logging into their web account, then going to the Select Forms by Owner page (as described above) and requesting the form(s) to which you have given them access. They need not enter an additional password for these forms.

Delete forms or records--Maintenance

You can delete forms, or particular records within forms, when the data is no longer needed using the Maintenance portion of Gather's advanced options.

1. Go to the Advanced Form Maintenance Options as described above.
2. Click on the Maintenance button. You see the form illustrated below.
   
3. Select the menu option desired. Since deleted information cannot be restored, you must check the "Really do it!" box before you can use the delete buttons. Once you have check this box, use the delete option which meets your needs.
   • Delete an entire form with the DeleteForm button (if you are no longer using the form)
   • Delete all data stored with the form via the DeleteAllData button ( if you wish to reuse a form with new data. This is particularly useful if you configure the form with validation rules or custom messages.)
   • Delete individual record, previously selected in when you displayed the data in a Table Y format using the DeleteMarked button (to remove test records, or incorrect records within a form)

Data Validation

It is important to get the right kind of data in your responses. In the fields for which you have a pop-up menu or radio buttons, users are restricted in the kind of answers they can give. If they answer at all, it will probably be a valid data type, whether or not it is accurate. In free-form fields, it is more likely that you will get data that does not make sense, or no data at all. If you want to require a response to a particular field, or restrict the type of response, you can do this with Gather's data validation feature.

In question #3 of the course evaluation form, respondents are asked how many hours they spend each week outside of class on assignments. Let's require a response to this question, and require that the response be a number. This data validation information will not be stored in the form itself, but rather in Gather's own database of information about the form. This means that you will need to recreate this information if you create a similar course evaluation form with a different FORM_NAME. The only way to avoid this would be to clear out the data for the old form with the DeleteAllData button (as described above), and call the new form by the same FORM_NAME.

Before you can create data validation information, you will need to submit data from the form at least once, so Gather knows that the form exists. Since you have already tested your form, even though you have cleared out all the actual data from your form, Gather still has the form listed in its database.

1. Go to the Advanced Form Maintenance Options as described above.
2. Click on the Maintenance button. You see a very long form, part of which illustrated below.
   
3. Under Validation Profile section at the top, click on the link for Add New Field.
4. Under Field Name, enter 03homework, the name we gave the response for question #3 in the form.
5. Fill out the appropriate boxes to require a response that is a number in the range of 0-100, as shown in the graphic below. The range 0:100 should appear under Valid Values.
6. Add an error message that users will get if they do not respond correctly to this question. The response can include HTML tags. For example, if you want to have your message in bold letters, enclosed your error message text with the <b> and </b> tags.
7. When you have completed the form, it will look like the illustration below.
   
8. Do not fill in the bottom half of the form that talks about related fields.
9. Click on the button UpdateValidationProfile at the bottom of the form.
10. Test your form to see if you get an error message when you skip question #3, or when you enter invalid data.
11. Go back and ListValidationProfile for your form to see that the correct information is listed.

User Authentication

You can limit form responses to a specified list of tri-college users. These users will be required to authenticate themselves with their email username and password. For example, you can limit who can respond to your course evaluation form to only those students in your class, provided you have a list of their full email addresses. Be sure to include your name on the list, so you can test your form.

To do user authentication, you must have three fields in your form called AUTH_USER, AUTH_HOST and AUTH_PASSWORD. When a user submits your form, these values must contain valid values for a username@hostname and a valid password.

1. Go back to your course evaluation form and create a new text field that is eight characters long before the submit button. You must call the field AUTH_USER. Prompt the user to enter his or username. (You can also add some text explaining the reason for requiring a username/password, as shown below.)
2. Put an @ sign following the text field and then make a pop-up menu field called AUTH_HOST where the user can choose either "pop.haverford.edu", "brynmawr.edu" or "swarthmore.edu". The values sent to Gather must match these choices.
3. Next, choose Password from the form field. This is just a special text field. Give it a name of AUTH_PASSWORD with about 10 characters. The only difference between a text field and a field of type "Password" is that, when the user types in the password field, the characters will appear as dots (hidden) rather than characters.
   

The web form now allows the user to authenticate him or herself. Now set up the Gather database needs to require user authentication.

1. Go through the process to ListValidationProfile for your form. (See the section on Data Validation.)
2. Scroll down to the section Configure Record Entry Authorization.
3. Under Authentication Method, choose POP3 Server (the email server).
4. Under Authentication Options, enter 1 for Maximum number of records per user. This will ensure that each student can submit only one course evaluation form.
5. Check the box for Destroy authentication credentials. This means that the student's username and hostname will not be saved by Gather together with the responses to the survey. (Note that the password is never saved, regardless of whether you check the box or not.) That is, the survey will be anonymous.
6. When your form is complete it will look like the illustration below. Click the Save button for this section.
   

You now require users to authenticate themselves with valid tri-college usernames and passwords, but you have not told Gather which students are eligible to submit a survey. Any tri-college user can fill out the form. To restrict who can fill out the form to specific users, you will need to use data validation on the AUTH_USER and AUTH_HOST fields.

1. Return to the ListValidationProfile for your form. (See the section on Data Validation, or go back to the Validation Profile page you used before and Reload.)
2. In the Data Validation section, click on Add New Field.
3. Type in the field name AUTH_USER. Choose Y for require and validate. Choose type TEXT and EXACT.
4. Type in an error message that you want users who are not members of the class to receive if they try to submit the form.
5. For the list of Valid Values, type the usernames (usernames only; host names appear in a different field) for several of the members of today's workshop, one to a line. Include yourself, but leave out at least one person in the workshop. You will ask that person to check to make sure that Gather is validating correctly against your list of users.
6. Your form should look like the illustration below. Click on the UpdateValidationProfile button.
   
7. Now, go back to the validation profile and add a field entitled AUTH_HOST with similar options. Make the list of valid hosts (values):
   pop.haverford.edu
   brynmawr.edu
   swarthmore.edu
8. Click on the UpdateValidationProfile button when you're finished.
9. Your Validation Profile should now match the illustration below. Check your validation profile for the new fields. Try submitting your form with your username/password, and again without it, to make sure authentication works.
   

Customized Error Messages

Gather provides default messages that users will receive when they successfully submit a form, when they enter an invalid username/password, or when they try to submit the form more than the allotted number of times. You can customize your form to provide the user feedback messages you want. We customized error message for users who successfully submit a course evaluation form.

1. List the Validation Profile for your form (refresh or reload the page to reflect all changes).
2. Scroll down to the Configure Text Messages section.
3. Click on Edit Text Messages.
4. Type in your message and click on Create New String. The message below will include an email link to Professor Joe User.

   Thanks for submitting your course evaluation form for ES 100. I enjoyed having you in the class. Have a good summer!

   <A HREF="mailto:juser@haverford.edu">Professor Joe User</A>

5. The new message string now exists, but it must be assigned as the message for a successful submission.
6. Go back to the Validation Profile page and Reload.
7. Scroll down to the Configure Text Messages section.
8. In the pop-up menu for Record Successfully Saved, select the message you just added.
9. Click the Save button to the right of the message.

Post Your Form on a Web Server

1. Now that you have tested your form and know how to access your data, you are ready to "go live" with the form. That is, you can place it on a web server and ask your "students" (or research subjects) to fill it out. You should also note that sometimes a form posted on a web server behaves differently than a form that is located on your own computer (as was yours when you did the testing). If you were conducting a real survey, it would be wise to post your form on the web server where it will reside and test it there before going live with it.
2. For the purposes of the exercise, we'll assume that you are ready to put your form into production.
3. First, clear out all the test data that you have entered. To do this, follow the instructions under Form Maintenance above.
4. Next, copy the form onto the web server. Follow the directions for students or the directions for academic staff to put the form in the appropriate spot.
5. Try filling out the form yourself. (If you are doing this exercise in a workshop, your instructor will post the URLs of all the forms on a web page for everyone in the class to access.) Make sure you get the custom error message when you submit the form successfully. If you have added a mailto link in your message, make sure it works.
6. Now ask a number of people to fill out your form.
7. After people have submitted your form, check the data. You can view it on the screen using the Table Y format, or download it and view it in Excel.
8. Refer to Part I: Collect Data with Gather--Create the Web Form.