EZSurvey has been tested with Watcom SQL, Sybase, MS SQL Server, Oracle, Access, DB/2, and mySQL. Other databases will probably work, but EZSurvey may not use their auto-increment features.
For Access, EZSurvey expects the primary key to be called "ID".
For other databases, EZSurvey will query the database driver with the SQLPrimaryKeys() function, and look for the first entry whose table name matches. This search could fail if, for example, the database returns "myschema.mytable", while EZSurvey is looking for "mytable". If this search fails then EZSurvey willa assume that the primary key is called "ID".
for Sybase/Watcom and Microsoft SQL, EZSurvey assumes that a primary key exists, and that it has an autoincrement property. EZSurvey will not attempt to set a primary key value for these databases.
For Oracle, EZSurvey expects there will be a sequence of the form "seq_mytable" which should be used to set the primary key. If the schema name is specified in the table, the expected sequence is "myschema.seq_mytable".
For other databases, or if no field is flagged as a primary key, "ID" and a pseudorandom sequence are used to identify records.
The browser-returned information should be translated before it's sent to the database, so that data analysis can run online. For example: "Q1_A=1&Q1_B=1" gets converted to "Q1=A,B". The inverse must also be true. In order for rank order questions to be correctly translated back, the database must have access to the field definitions, which are in the FIELDS section of the ini file. This also tells the CGI program which fields it should save (_PAGENEXT, _SESSION, _FORMDONE, HOST, DATE, TIME must be explicitly listed here, and placed in the database, in order for multi-page save and resume forms to work). Field types are the abbreviated names found in http://www.electronicform.org/efs.html.
The EZS CGI will only write those fields that are listed in the INI file! This will prevent people from overwriting demographic fields in the main database.
Raosoft EZReport, EZSurvey, InterForm, RapidReport, Raosoft, and SurveyWin
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You may use and modify this file for your own use, but may not distribute
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This software is provided "as is," and Raosoft makes no warranty, express
or implied, of fitness for a particular application. Every measure has been
taken to anticipate risks inherent to computer networks, but we cannot
guarantee safety or reliability of this program in every situation.
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