Survey database

[MatMac]

Regarding a survey database with a normalised structure, e.g. one table of responses linked to a table of questions...

If some survey questions require numerically coded responses, and some free text responses, would an appropriate structure be to use two response tables, one for each data type?

 

[FoFa]

There are different ways to handle this, but seperate tables is proably not the best, depending on your application. What you could do (one example) is in your form, flag each question as numeric/true false/test and have seperate fields for each in one table. THen you form could hide/show the proper field by the type of flag set for that question. So if the question required a numeric answer, it set s the true false and test fields to invisible, and the numeric field to visible. You can bind each field to the proper column in your table that way and control which column is updated via your form. but there are other ways to approach it also, like keep it a test field and use VAL to return a numeric, etc.

 

[MatMac]

Yes - thats one way. The problem there is that each of my surveys has over 500 items. If I put multiple fields in the responses table, that will be a lot of wasted storage, due to all the Nulls being stored. That's why I thought to use separate tables.

 

[amanco]

Regarding a survey database with a normalised structure, e.g. one table of responses linked to a table of questions...

If some survey questions require numerically coded responses, and some free text responses, would an appropriate structure be to use two response tables, one for each data type?

try At Your Survey