Using Open Text Questions in Aggregated Tables

You can also add open text questions to aggregated tables. When an open text question is used, a category list is created dynamically from the actual data; each unique answer becomes a category.

Note: The open text question must have a value set for its Field Width property and must be marked as an BitStream Variable in its question properties sheet in the Authoring questionnaire designer. Refer to the Professional Authoring documentation for further details.

To use an open text question in an aggregate table:

1. Create an aggregated table and drag the open text question to the rows or columns as required.
2. Add another question to the other axis of the table as necessary.
3. Open the header variable for the open text question (go to Header Variable Property Sheet for more information), and uncheck "Collapsed".
4. Under Sorting:
5. Check "Enabled" and specify the header by which the list is to be sorted.
6. Set a value for "Top N" and optionally "Bottom N". At least one of these values must be non-zero, and the sum of both must not exceed 100.
7. Save the changes and refresh the table.

The table will now show the various answers to the open text question as categories. The specified number of "Top N" and "Bottom N" categories are shown, and the Categories are sorted by the count values in the specified header in the other axis of the table.

The example below .shows an aggregate table using the Name open text question in Rows and a Gender single question in Columns. "Top N" is specified as 10, so 10 names are currently listed (test data is used here, so the names are sequences of randomly generated letters). The number of Males and Females and totals using each name is given in the appropriate columns. In this case, the full data set comprises 40 males and 31 females.

Figure 1 - Example of an open text question being used in an aggregated table