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^C^1Survey Tabulator
^Cby
^CDaniel Tobias

   If you ever have to count ballots, surveys, or questionnaires, you will find
this program useful.  It allows you to set up a series of questions, including 
multiple choice, weighted-preference, and numeric ones, and then go through 
the stack of incoming surveys and tabulate their data.  The result is a running
total of the responses to each question.  We originally created this program 
for our own use in tabulating the subscriber survey (see the article in the 
Diskussion section for that questionnaire's results), and it proved so useful we
decided to make it available for others to use.


^CHow To Use It

   When you run ^1Survey Tabulator^0, either by selecting "Run It" from the menu,
or by typing ^1PASRUN TABULATE^0 from DOS, you will be asked if you wish to load
survey data from disk.  You can answer "YES" and select the default file, 
^1SURVEY.DAT^0, which has been set up with a sample survey.  Or, say "NO."  You will
be placed in the initial setup section so you can create a new survey. 


^CSetting Up a Survey

   Enter the data for each question one at a time, or press ENTER with no input 
if there are no more questions.  First, enter the text of the question, like 
"What kind of display adapter do you have?"  Next, indicate what kind of 
question it is:  multiple choice, weighted preference, or numeric. 

   A multiple choice question presents a list of possible answers, and the 
respondent should check one (or more) of them.  In the setup phase for a 
multiple choice question you will be asked for the names of the choices; type 
them one at a time, pressing ENTER with no input when done.  For instance, 
choices for the display adapter question might include "Color Graphics Adapter" 
and "Monochrome Display Adapter."  There is a provision to add new choices 
during the tabulation process to handle "write-ins."  For this reason, you need 
not enter any choices in the setup process; you can leave that to be created 
"on the fly" as you go along. 

   You can use multiple choice with the "write-in" capability to handle short-
answer questions like "How much RAM does your system have?" even if they don't 
have specific choices to be checked.  If the expected answers are mostly one 
of a small list of values, then just add "choices" to the list as they come up.

   Weighted-preference questions are a variant of multiple-choice.  The 
respondents are asked to name a first preference, a second preference, and so 
on, and the total score for each choice is given by assigning different weights 
to different levels of preference.  For instance, a first-place vote can be 
worth 10 points, a second-place vote 5 points, and a third-place vote 1 point.  
Under these values, a choice gathering 2 first-place votes, 4 second-place 
votes, and 1 third-place vote, would have a score of 41, which would beat 
another choice which had 4 first-place votes but no second- or third-place 
votes. 

   To set up a weighted-preference question, you will be prompted to input the 
weights for each place.  ^1Survey Tabulator^0 will handle up to five places; the
sixth and succeeding choices (if any) for a question will be given the same 
weight as the fifth place.  If you wish to use less than five places, then
give a weight of zero to later places, which will cause them to be discounted 
entirely.  Weights can be any real number, such as 22 or 3.141592654.

   Numeric questions are those for which a number is expected as an answer.  
Any real number can be used, and the mean and standard deviation will be 
calculated for the survey results.  No setup is needed for numeric questions 
after entering the question text and type.


^CMain Menu

   Once the setup phase is completed, or you have loaded a data file, you will 
be placed in the main menu.  The choices here are as follows: 

^1(A)dd survey data.^0  This is used to tabulate surveys.
^1(O)utput report.^0  This lets you see a report of the results on screen or 
printer.
^1(S)ort data.^0  This lets you get the choices for multiple choice and weighted-
preference questions in descending order of popularity, which is what you 
probably would like for reports.
^1(E)dit data.^0  This lets you change the data for the current survey.
^1(R)ead data.^0  This lets you read survey data from disk.
^1(W)rite data.^0  This lets you write survey data to disk.
^1(C)reate a new survey.^0  Returns to the setup phase to create a new survey.
^1(Q)uit.^0  Exits the program.

   If you have added or changed data, you will be given a chance to save before 
the Read, Create, or Quit commands are executed, since these will destroy the 
data that is already in memory.


^CAdding Data

   The main part of the program is reached by the A command from the main 
menu.  In this section, you are prompted one by one with the survey questions.  
For multiple choice and weighted-preference questions, all the choices will be 
shown, along with their current totals.  For multiple choice questions, both 
the number of responses and their percentage of the total number of surveys 
tabulated is shown.  For weighted-preference questions, the number of responses 
for first through fifth place is shown, along with the total responses and the 
weighted score.  For numeric questions, the number of responses, the mean, and 
the standard deviation is shown. 

   If there are more choices than will fit on the screen at once, a "More" 
prompt is given; press N or ESC to abort the listing, or any other key to go on.

   Enter the answer on the survey you are tabulating:  for numeric questions, 
type a number; for multiple choice and weighted-preference questions, type the 
number of the choice that was selected.  For "write-ins," type A, and you will 
be prompted for a new choice which will be added to the list and given one vote 
to start.  To skip the question entirely, press ENTER with no input.

   If more than one answer was selected in a multiple choice question, enter 
the choices separated by commas.  You can include the "A" command for write-ins 
at any point in your input; so if the user selected choices 2 and 3, and three 
write-in choices, you can type ^12,3,A,A,A^0.  If you end the line with a 
comma, you will be re-prompted for additional answers to the same question once 
the ones you entered are tabulated.

   For weighted-preference questions, enter the selected choices in the same 
manner, but here the order matters.  If a user picked choice 3 first, a write-
in second, choice 1 third, and another write-in fourth, type ^13,A,1,A^0. 

   When you have entered a response to one question (and your line doesn't end 
with a comma), the next question will be presented, and so on until the end of 
the survey.  You can end the entry earlier with the Q command.  Using Q in 
response to the first question will bring you to the main menu; if you use it 
later you will first be prompted for the disposition of the partial entry you 
have made.

   One more option you have is to back up with the B command.  This lets you 
go back one question, "undoing" the answer(s) you made for the last question.  
Using B at the first question returns you to the menu.

   On conclusion of an entry (when the last question has been answered, or when 
the Q command is used after some data has been entered) you are prompted for 
the disposition of the entry.  You can choose whether to accept the entry or 
reject it; and you can list the given answers to check for errors which might 
cause you to reject it and try again.  Pressing ENTER accepts the entry 
(placing it into the full database) and goes on to do another (unless you used 
the Q command, in which case control returns to the main menu).  Pressing ESC 
"throws away" the latest entry and returns to the main menu.  There are also 
commands here to accept an entry but exit, or to reject an entry and go back 
for another. 


^COutputting a Report

   The O command from the main menu lets you output a report of survey results 
to the screen or printer.  The data will be shown in the same manner as they 
are during data entry.  For screen reports, "More" prompts are used at the end 
of each question and within lists of choices too long to fit on the screen, so 
things do not scroll off.  Press N or ESC to abort, any other key to continue.


^CSorting the Data

   Before you do a report, you might want the data to be sorted in descending 
order of popularity.  Use the S command from the main menu.  For each multiple 
choice or weighted-preference question, you will be prompted about whether you 
wish to sort its data.  If you say yes, the choices will be sorted by total 
number of responses (for multiple choice) or by weighted total (for weighted 
preference).


^CEditing Data

   The E command from the main menu lets you edit the survey data.  You will be 
prompted about whether you wish to edit data on each question; if you say yes 
you will be prompted for new values of various things including the text of the 
question and its choices, and the number of responses.  Press ENTER with no 
input at each item if you wish it to remain the same.


^CReading and Writing Data

   You can save the survey data to disk for later retrieval, using the W 
(Write) command.  This will store all data on the questions, choices, and 
results.  The R (Read) command loads data previously saved with the W command.  
When you are prompted for the filename to load or save you can press ENTER to 
use the default.  The default filename is "SURVEY.DAT" to begin with, but once 
you use the Read or Write command, the filename you use becomes the default for 
the next Read or Write. 


^CCreating a Survey

   The C command on the main menu lets you create a survey.  This just puts you 
in the setup section described above.


^CQuitting

   The Q command will exit to ~3|9Big Blue Disk^0 (or DOS if you are not running
^1Survey Tabulator^0 from our menu).

DISK FILES THIS PROGRAM USES:
^FTABULATE.CHN
^FPASRUN.COM
^FRETURN.CHN
^FSURVEY.DAT [sample data file]
