BUG

Survey123 field app crashes (closes) after a period of inactivity on the device

Last Published: January 21, 2025

Description

An example of how this "crash" may occur:

  • User begins filling out the survey, leaves the device for 15-30 minutes while auto-locked. Upon reopening the device to continue filling out the survey, Survey123 is no longer open.
    • When opening the application again, there is a "Recovered Survey" notice, and users can recover their data and continue filling out the survey.
    • Sometimes, the Recovered Survey notice does not appear 

Notes:

  • Previously (before June 2023), the application did not close after a period of inactivity, the survey would stay open
    • Behavior was first noticed in Survey123 field app version 3.18.142.
  • If only select-one questions were answered when the device locked, the survey does not get recovered.
  • This can be seen on both iOS and Android devices, but does not happen 100% of the time.
  • The function being within its own repeat actually does not cause any issues with submitting the survey, and the function does work. However, it causes unexpected behavior (Survey123 closing) if the device is locked.

Cause

This behavior can occur when there is an indexed-repeat function within the repeat it is referencing. This is not supported. See: ArcGIS Survey123 Use values from indexed repeats

Workaround

The indexed-repeat function within the repeat it was referencing should be removed to fix the survey closing after a device is inactive. 

Because this behavior is due to an unsupported workflow, the behavior itself will not be changed. However, there is a bug logged to notify users there may be unexpected behavior if they attempt to publish the survey that the indexed-repeat function within the repeat it is referencing. 

BUG-000160878 - ArcGIS Survey123 does not show an error or a notice that there may be unexpected behavior when the indexed-repeat calculation is referencing a field within its own repeat.

Article ID: 000031986

Software:
  • ArcGIS Survey123 Field App iOS
  • ArcGIS Survey123 Field App Android

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