Forms - Expand Conditional Logic Options

[anna_wahlsten]

When creating Forms on ACC the Conditional Logic options are very restrictive, and we would like to have more customisation possibilities.  In the below example, I would like more options to choose from in the drop down menu, and most importantly, I would want a bespoke text field. I want the form to be able to say "If no, please write why" and a text field option where people can type in their answers without having to make it a separate question for it, and the option to say "if yes, please skip question 6" for example, and for question 6 to be greyed out if someone has selected yes. This will stop people from filling out wrong or unnecessary sections, and would make the forms more efficient.

[buildintel]

@anna_wahlsten This might be a workaround worth trying. At least until there is a product update.

Create an issue type "For Information/Review". Configure it to be very simple, with only the very basic parameters.

Then if the check is "No" then must raise an issue for Information/review. 

This way you give someone an opportunity to have a say if the reason they chose no was acceptable or not

Hope it works

[Roger_Feste-Symetri]

I agree, there should be more options. An "easy" fix would be new options like "Require a Note" and "Suggest a Note". That would have been a small but great update. 
Use case: If you choose N/A --> Require a Note. Just to clarify why it is N/A?
This could also help in this use case to avoid a lot of questions Additional fields added in forms based on answers. - Autodesk Community

[Roger_Feste-Symetri]

Dalux have these possibilities

[CIPuyleart]

SO many ways to improve conditional formatting.

I would definitely agree with, at a minimum, adding in the "suggest a note" and "require a note" - there are many times when that is all we need and want added to the form.

And there are many times we would like to open up a new section, or require answers to additional questions, based on a specific response. Gated logic in form building is a fundamental tool in many other platforms - especially for complex safety reporting that has a high amount of data needed for certain types of incidents.

I would also like to see the option to disallow "N/A" as an answer.  N/A is not a true Boolean - it is a "non-state" that breaks many pieces of business logic and programming (we deal with it constantly with Revit API - check box parameters are not in any state by default). Are there questions we may have on a form that do have "N/A" as an option - yes. But there are other required questions that have no business offering "N/A" as an option. 

[swotton8FJDD]

This is a really good idea.

[dsantos6M8FZ]

We would like the ability to create another question based on the response to the original question.  If Yes, then the user would be prompted to answer another related question.

[jredelman]

I agree!  It would be great to require or suggest a note in addition to photos and issues.

[emilio.mercado]

UPDATE: We have clear direction to expand these capabilities, so we've updated it status to Accepted. As and several of you noted, the possibilities/variations are endless! If possible, we would like to deliver those things that make a difference earlier.

QUESTION: How would you rank these solutions in terms of which would make more of a difference to your business today?

1. Require/Suggest a Note depending on an answer
2. Add/Skip Questions depending on an answer
3. Add/Skip Sections depending on an answer
4. Preconfigured Boolean questions (e.g. Yes/No, Pass/Fail, etc.)
5. Something else?

A short comment/example on what type of workflows this would unblock will also be very useful. Thanks in advance!

[Roger_Feste-Symetri]

a, b and c would be great in that order. 

[jredelman]

I agree with a priority of option A then B then C.

[dsantos6M8FZ]

Thank you for moving this forward. I also agree with the prioritization of option A, B and then C.

These options will help streamline our form creation and avoid overwhelming respondents with inapplicable questions.

[jw.vanasselt]

@emilio.mercado is it possible to add an option "Required a Form" ? 

Another addition in this case will be a '+' sign for the answers. Currently, a single answer is often expected, but consider the following situation:

Providing information on installation components—in one instance there might be two, while in another project there are six.

[Roger_Feste-Symetri]

For that you can use the table and insert lines and then reference to them other places in the form. Not perfect, but a workaround for now.

[jw.vanasselt]

@Roger_Feste-Symetri We use that for air terminal information but sometime we need photo's for each component.
That's not available in tables

[Roger_Feste-Symetri]

@jw.vanasselt true. You can always add photos to a question in a form, but it will be data that is not connected in the best way. Have you looked at using Assets and add Forms templates to the categories and photos to objects+++ Might be a solution? I would then recommend adjusting the forms to that workflow. 

[adnanirfanshaikh5YSA4]

@emilio.mercado 

a, b, c would be the perfect place to start with. By allowing questions to be displayed based on a selection will greatly benefit a user completing the form. 
Do you have any idea by when this functionality would be implemented?

[lpagtakhan]

@emilio.mercado 

Options a, b, and c are good

[d_dinardo]

Hi @emilio.mercado, 
based on the proposals you shared, I would rank them B, C, E, A, D.
For E, I mean the possibility of adding another level of structure to the questions.

It would also be helpful, while completing the form, to group or collapse questions for easier reading. Another useful option would be to highlight answered questions with a colored background, making them easier to distinguish from those that still require an answer.

[andresa_cardoso]

Hi @emilio.mercado 

Ranking the five options from our side, in order:

1 - Add/skip sections based on a response
2 - Add/skip questions based on a response
3 - Require or suggest a note based on a response
4 - Something else (detailed below)
5 - Preconfigured Boolean questions

Here is the use case driving that order, in case the detail helps.

I work at MRV&CO (one of the largest homebuilders in Brazil). We are currently migrating our land technical-feasibility process into Build, across six regional teams. The instrument is a single record per land parcel that evolves through eight business stages - from prospecting, through acquisition, massing study, design, deed, building permit, pre-launch and launch. Altogether it is over 200 questions across 19 sections. To give a sense of volume: our land development team opens roughly 800 feasibility and cost assessment requests a year - and the overwhelming majority are at the prospecting and acquisition stages, which is exactly where the form is least usable today.

The problem is that each stage only needs a subset. At the prospecting stage, around 110 of those questions apply - the remaining 120 or so depend on documents, surveys or contracts that do not exist yet. Without section-level conditional logic, our field engineers are shown every question from day one and have to answer “N/A” to more than half of them, on a mobile device, on site. In our pilot this was the single most repeated complaint.

Our current workaround is eight separate form templates, one per stage, attached to the same Asset, using the Asset status set to represent the stage. It works, but it costs us:

• Fields shared between stages are duplicated across templates, with no way to carry an answer forward
• Reporting is fragmented across eight forms per land parcel instead of one record
• Template maintenance multiplies by eight, across six regions

Add/skip sections would collapse all of that into a single template per land parcel. That is why it ranks first for us - ahead of question-level skipping, which solves a smaller version of the same problem.

On “something else”, two items would matter to us:

• Conditional logic based on any earlier answer in the form, not only the immediately preceding question. Our stage field sits in the first section and would need to drive visibility throughout the form.
• Calculated fields - simple arithmetic between numeric responses. We currently export to BI to compute values that the field team needs to see while still on site.

Happy to share more detail on the structure if it helps your prioritisation.