X-Cart:Survey

Overview

X-Survey is intended for creation of customer surveys and polls to be conducted among the visitors of an X-Cart-based store in order to obtain customer feedback about the goods provided by the store, the store website usability and design, the quality of service and various other aspects of the store operation.

The key features of X-Survey add-on module include:

• Easy to use online surveys and website polls available either on separate web pages or in X-Cart's menu boxes.
• Wide range of question types (single choice, multiple choice and text fields for open-ended questions).
• Automatic and manual sending of survey invitation e-mails.
• Control over the availability of specific surveys (Surveys can be publicly available, password protected, or available only via a direct link).
• Unlimited questions and answers.
• Detailed survey statistics (Printable version available).
• Multilingual support.

X-Survey add-on module is a very flexible survey software solution for X-Cart which can be used to create a variety of surveys and polls with any number of questions and answer options for each question. It is extremely easy to use, allowing even the most non-technically minded user to create, administer and collect the results of on-line surveys.

The range of question types supported by the module is wide enough to meet the needs of most users who will use it to create surveys: X-Survey makes it possible to create questions that respondents will answer by selecting a single answer option, by selecting multiple options, or by providing their own textual answer.

The store administrator controls access of store visitors to specific surveys and decides whether a survey should be available to all visitors of the store website (both registered and unregistered users), just registered users or only a limited group of persons to whom an invitation has been sent with a direct link to the survey page. The survey invitation message is fully customizable and can be mailed to e-mail addresses entered by hand, imported from a CSV file, selected from the profiles of registered customers or borrowed from an existing list of the store's newsletter subscribers. Yet another exciting option for the store administrator is to setup X-Survey in such a way that the application will automatically send survey invitations to the customers who purchased a specific product or placed an order for a specified amount.

Depending on the module settings, surveys can be displayed in X-Cart's menu boxes or on separate pages within your store. A list of surveys available to the customer can be found in the 'Surveys' section of the Customer zone (accessible via the Surveys link in the Special menu box).

A survey is entered into the database after a customer answers some or all of its questions and submits the survey form. Precautions can be taken against multiple responses by same individuals: in addition to the limitation according to which any survey can be completed only once per user session, it is possible to set an IP blocked time period during which re-submitting of a survey from the same IP will be prohibited.

X-Survey gathers statistics on the survey forms being submitted, so the store administrator can easily access the overall statistics on any specific survey as well as statistics on specific survey questions. A printable version of the statistical data of any survey can be easily obtained. It is also possible to view individual survey forms submitted by survey respondents.

Installing X-Survey

For successful installation and work of the module you need an already installed X-Cart 4.3.0.

The process of installing the module X-Survey is the same for X-Cart Gold and X-Cart Pro.

To install the module, take the following steps:

1. Download the module distributive from the File area. The package you need is contained in the archive file x-survey-x.y.z.tgz, where x, y, z are your X-Cart version numbers.
2. Decompress the distribution package archive to a local directory on your system using your favorite compression program (any archiver with support for TAR files).
3. Upload the resulting files to the server directory where your X-Cart is installed.

Note: Please make sure you keep the directory structure during unpacking and uploading, otherwise some necessary files can be overwritten!

1. Point your browser at the location of your store with the addition of /install-xsurvey.php to launch the Installation Wizard.

For example, if your domain name is www.example.com and your X-Cart-based store is installed in the directory /xcart off your web root, you should enter http://www.example.com/xcart/install-xsurvey.php into your browser address line.

5. Follow the Wizard's instructions to install the add-on module at your site:

1. Step 1: License agreement.

This step provides a Software License Agreement for you to accept and requires you to enter your Auth code.

Please read the Software License Agreement. If you agree to all of the terms of this agreement, select the 'I accept the License Agreement' check box.

Note: By selecting the 'I accept the License Agreement' check box, you are consenting to be bound by this agreement. If you do not agree to the terms of the agreement, do not install the software.

Use the field 'Auth code' to enter your Auth code. Auth code is a special authentication code that protects your X-Cart installation. Such a code was issued to you when you first installed your X-Cart-based store. If you do not remember your Auth code, you can look it up in X-Cart's file include/install.php or in the 'Summary' section of your store's Admin zone ("Your AUTH code for re-installing skins and installing modules is: XXXXXXXX").

Click the Next button.

b) Step 2: Installing and configuring the module.

The installation script will create a directory skin1/modules/Survey and copy the module files to that directory. It will also make changes to the database by creating the necessary database tables.

Click Next to proceed.

c) Step 3: Installation complete.

This is the final step of X-Survey installation. It notifies you that the module has been successfully installed and provides a link to the administration back-end of the store where you can enable and configure the module.

Uninstalling X-Survey

To uninstall X-Survey, do the following:

1 Launch the Installation Wizard (Point your browser at the location of your store with the addition of /install-xsurvey.php)

1. At the first step of the Installation Wizard (Step 1: License agreement), select the 'Un-install the module' radio button.

Click the Next button.

3. The Installation Wizard will remove the module files and deactivate the module (Step 2: Uninstalling the module).

Click Next to proceed.

4. Step 3: Uninstallation complete is the final step of the uninstallation process. It notifies you that the module has been successfully uninstalled.

After uninstalling X-Survey, be sure to remove the module distribution package from your web directory.