Continuous Dialing – Keeping interviewers from sitting on a single screen

To set up continuous dialing, there are a few things that need to be set up in the spec.


Part 1


1) Use the SPECIAL,ABORT_INTERVIEW_NO_CR command instead of SPECIAL,ABORT_INTERVIEWin your spec. Any time the call is terminated short of a complete the interviewer will jump to the top of the next interview with no chance to sit at the “quit” prompt. If the interviewer gets a complete or a suspend, they do get the prompt and can sit there.

2) Use the FORCE_INTO_INTERVIEW command in the Supervisor. This sets the number of seconds that the interviewer can sit on the quit screen before they are pushed into the next interview. Be advised if you set this low enough, then they can’t go on break or stop themselves and those functions must be performed by the Supervisor. You can set the command in the suprinit file and then it will always be in effect. There should be a comment already in the file about it. The suprinit file is in the support sub-directory.


NOTE: This command does not work for webCATI stations as they are not started up by a Supervisor.

3) Use the SPECIAL,QUITSCREEN_TIMEOUT,<seconds> command in the questionnaire. This does the same as theFORCE_INTO_INTERVIEWcommand above, except this controls things at the questionnaire level.


Part 2


If talking about a screen within the survey:

1) If the question is a display, then we recommend you use a DISPLAY,KEYBOARD_WAITwhich not only allows the interviewer to hit return to immediately go on, but also allows you to set a timeout that just automatically continues to the next question.

2) If it is a question that actually requires an answer, it gets trickier, but you can use the SPECIAL,FILL_NEXT_QUESTION_IF_IDLE,<seconds>to create a default answer for the question. However, we would actually recommend that you not have any questions that need an answer prior to the dial if in fact you are trying to get them through that section as quickly as possible.

NOTE: WebSurvent supports all question types with timers that submit after “N” seconds.

These include:

  • !DISPLAY,TIMED_WAIT,<seconds> – Shows text for the # of seconds defined then automatically moves on to the next page.
  • !DISPLAY,KEYBOARD_WAIT,<seconds> – Does the same as above but allows you to press “Next” at any time to move on to the next page.
  • !SPECIAL,PAUSE,<seconds> – Causes the screen to pause for the # of seconds defined.
  • !SPECIAL,FILL_NEXT_QUESTION_IF_IDLE,<seconds>,<label:response> – Allows you to enter data but if you do not within the # of seconds defined, it fills the response for you and moves on.

The SPECIAL,FILL_NEXT_QUESTION_IF_IDLEfeature allows youto submit grids after # seconds and allows you to fill in all the questions with responses when submitted.

The syntax is:

!SPECIAL,FILL_NEXT_QUESTION_IF_IDLE,<seconds>,<label1:response1>,...<labeln:responsen>This is set in the template file "submit_timers.tmpl" in $CFMC/websurv/tmpl/WC_default directory.

There is also a feature to display a timer on the screen while waiting for the SPECIAL,FILL_NEXT_QUESTION_IF_IDLEto activate which you can invoke by uncommenting the code at the bottom of submit_timers.tmpl. It uses the supplied DisplayTimer.js javascript.

Example:

{!SPECIAL,FILL_NEXT_QUESTION_IF_IDLE,10,Q3:2,Q4:99 }

The above examplesays, when you execute the next GRID, if the page is not submitted within 10 seconds, auto-fill a “2” for Q3 and a “99” for Q4 and submit the page.


See theDocs Sitefor more information on each of these.