Publish Your Engagement Questionnaire

At a Glance

Publish your completed engagement questionnaire to make it accessible to community members according to your configured schedule and visibility settings. Publishing activates your questionnaire and changes its status from draft to live, enabling participant access and response collection.

Key requirement: Open and close dates must be set before publishing is possible.

Core Steps

1. Navigate to Ask > Surveys > Build select your engagement activity
   
   
2. Complete your questionnaire content in the Build tab
3. Configure required settings including open/close dates on the settings tab 
   
   
4. Click Publish in the top navigation
   
   
5. Confirm publishing in the modal dialog
   
   
    

In-Depth Guide

Pre-Publishing Requirements

Before you can publish, ensure:

• Questionnaire content is complete in the Build tab
• Open and close dates are set in the Settings tab (required)
• All other settings are configured as desired
• Any translation work is completed (if applicable)

The system validates these requirements and prevents publishing if critical information is missing.

Initiating the Publishing Process

To publish your questionnaire:

1. From any tab of your questionnaire, click the Publish button in the top right navigation
2. A confirmation modal appears titled "Publish Engagement"
3. The modal displays a message based on your Publicly Visible setting:
   • When Publicly Visible is ON: "Publishing this activity will make it publicly visible."
4. Review the confirmation message and click Publish to proceed, or Cancel to return to editing

Understanding Status Changes

After successful publishing:

• Activity status changes from Unpublished to Upcoming (if opening date is in the future) or Open (if currently within the active date range)
• The Publish button is replaced with View and Take Offline buttons
• A green success notification appears: "[Activity Type] Published"
• Your questionnaire becomes accessible according to its configured schedule and visibility settings

Handling Publishing Errors

If publishing fails due to validation issues:

The system displays clear error messages to guide you:

• Settings tab: Error banner states "1 Error Found: Set Dates & Times Before Publishing"
• Build tab: Error banner shows "1 Error Found: Set Dates & Times Before Publishing"
• Date fields: Show "Error message" text under empty date/time fields
• Bottom notification: Red banner states "Publishing Failed. Fix errors and try again."

To resolve validation errors:

1. Navigate to the Settings tab
2. Set both Opens and Closes dates and times
3. Click Save to apply the changes
4. Return to any tab and click Publish again

If publishing fails due to system issues:

• You'll see a red notification: "Publishing Failed. Try again"
• Your work is automatically saved, so no content is lost
• Simply attempt to publish again after the system issue resolves

Post-Publishing Management

Once your questionnaire is published:

• View: Experience your questionnaire exactly as participants will see it
• Take Offline: Temporarily disable access while preserving response data
• Settings: Most settings become locked, but you can still view configurations
• Archive: Permanently disable the questionnaire (available in Settings tab)

Publishing Timeline and Processing

Understanding the publishing process:

• Publishing typically completes within a few minutes
• During processing, the Publish button may show a loading state
• The system coordinates activation across multiple components
• Your questionnaire remains accessible for editing until publishing completes
• Status updates occur automatically once the process finishes

Understanding the Details

Validation Requirements

The publishing system enforces critical requirements to ensure questionnaire functionality. Open and close dates are mandatory because they define when participants can access your engagement. Without these dates, the system cannot properly schedule or manage access.

Visibility and Access Control

Publishing behavior varies based on your Publicly Visible setting:

• Publicly Visible ON: Questionnaire appears on configured pages and can be discovered by community members browsing your site
• Publicly Visible OFF: Questionnaire is accessible only via direct links you distribute to specific participants

Additional settings like Requires Code and Kiosk Mode work in combination with visibility settings to provide layered access control.

System Coordination

Publishing involves coordinating multiple system components to ensure consistent questionnaire availability. This includes activating response collection, enabling participant access, applying visibility settings, and initializing analytics tracking.

Important Notes

Publishing Timeline: The publishing process may take a few minutes to complete across all systems. Your questionnaire will become fully accessible once this process finishes.

Settings Lock: Most questionnaire settings cannot be changed after publishing without first taking the questionnaire offline.

Response Collection: Once published and within the active date range, your questionnaire immediately begins accepting and storing participant responses.

Error Recovery: If publishing fails, your work is automatically saved and you can retry once issues are resolved. The system preserves all content and settings during error recovery.