Save Draft to Cloud
A function to save a draft record to the cloud, so that a single record can be edited between Webforms and a mobile device without having to submit the record first.
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Hi Sean,
I would think that if we were to implement this, being able to save a draft record to the cloud would essentially be the same as syncing the record to the cloud.
The only way I can see this being useful is if there are elements that are required in your form and you cannot sync those records due to incomplete elements.
Would you say that this is your use case? If not, could you give some of your use cases?
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Hi,
I wasn't able to find a way to sync a record to the cloud without submitting it - is there an existing way to do this?
I am envisioning a workflow where we would begin filling out a record on our phones (collecting data in the field), and then continue editing and eventually submit that same record later on on our laptops through webforms (adding text-heavy data). However when I start a record on my phone, that record doesn't seem to show up on webforms for later editing. It seems like the record only exists on my phone, since it hasn't been synced or uploaded to the cloud before it is submitted.
We are trying to avoid having to submit and then reassign the record to move between webforms and our devices, since we have Webmerge 3rd party processing after submitting and it would also have to involve an admin to reassign every time. I was going through this with our customer support contact who encouraged me to submit a feature request.
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Hi Sean,
You are correct that there is no way to sync a record to the cloud without submitting it at the moment.
Unfortunately, this is not a simple implementation as we will need to make changes in several areas on our platform (device, server, and Webforms).
So, although I cannot promise you that this will be implemented, I can promise to bring this up to with the engineering team and discuss this as your use case is very valid and could be useful for other users as well.
I can respond here and give you an update on how the discussion went with the engineering team.
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Sounds good, thanks. If you are able to do it it would also make our use of iformbuilder more marketable on our end, since one of our selling points when we bid for new projects is the cost-saving efficiency/streamlined process that it allows us (we submit hourly costs with our proposals).
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Hi Sean,
I would like to let you know that I brought this up to the engineering team so it's on everyone's radar.
It turns out we have already documented a feature similar to what you've request in the past.
However, at the time of the documentation of this feature, we determined that the need for something like this was very small (as Webforms was relatively new). Due to this reasoning, when we planned out our yearly projects/features this did not get included.
We will keep monitoring to see if other customers are starting to request for similar features and revisit to see if can implement this.
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Hello,
I just thought I would share this conversation, where the same issue independently came up for a new person on our team (not being able to edit a draft report on a different device):
I do have one question. From what I can tell if I start the report on my phone I have to finish it on my phone. I can’t reopen and edit it on my iPad. Is that correct?Yes, I think that's correct. I think when you start drafting a report it is only saved on the local storage of that device until you submit it and it uploads to the cloud, which triggers the automated report generation. At that point you could assign the report back to a different device, which I imagine might not make sense for your workflow. -
HI Sean, Thanks for the feedback here! our application is not like the google suite where many people can work on something at the same time.
To your question yes once the report is started on a device it must be finished on that device. However what we have done with many clients in the past is to put a Status field on the device that says something like (open, in progress, completed) Each time this record is filled out the user would be responsible for updating the status. Reports would be generated along the way to give stakeholders updates and they can see the status change or stay the same each time.
Between each submission yes you could assign that record back to another user to continue working on it.
Let me know if you would like to have a call and we can discuss this in more detail. (bray@zerionsoftware.com)
Thanks,
Ben
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