The fifth release of the C16 Release Track delivering fantastic improvements driven almost exclusively by Centercode customers like yourself!
For the fifth installment on the C16 Release Track, we focused on delivering highly requested feature improvements instead of completely new features. These improvements enrich the functionality already present in the platform and help administrators solve common challenges without using fragile workarounds.
Easily Organize Your Choices
It’s just like it sounds - lists of items in any Choices element can easily be sorted Alpha-numerically or set to randomize. The Choices elements’ interface has two new components which blend in seamlessly - check out the screenshots below.
Alpha-Numeric Sort is perfect for long lists of choices like product names, brands, commonly recognized features, or any other list requiring that respondents “search” for their choice in the list. 
Click the Public or Internal Label header to sort the list Ascending or Descending based on the chosen column
Randomizing response options is a universal, long-accepted best practice when surveying testers as a means of eliminating “response order bias” in your results and encourage truthful responses from your testers. With this release, Centercode’s Choices elements now support randomization by way of a simple checkbox:
Every time the form is loaded or refreshed, the listed choices are re-randomized
Important Notes:
- You should be consciously applying a sorting method to every Choices element.
- In addition to sorting via deliberate drag-and-drop, you can use the Internal Label field, you can apply your own unique Ascending or Descending sort based on Choice Labels that are hidden from the respondent. This is easiest when adding choices en masse via copy-paste (note the pipe: Choice1|Label1).
Choose Your Own Adventure Notices
Have you ever wanted to allow the user to choose their own destination by offering multiple links within a Notice? Using Click-Through Notices was sometimes awkward because the user couldn’t proceed unless they specifically clicked Continue. By adding seemingly small functionality to Click-Through Notices, we’ve dramatically enhanced their capability. While the change might seem nuanced, the implications are wide-reaching and apply to many user stories I’ve heard over the years.
The Require Button Click option is defaulted OFF, so clicking the default button OR a link in your Notice will count it “complete”
With the default settings (click not required), Click-Through Notices are considered “completed” as they’re viewed, meaning they can be subsequently bypassed by additional clicks. Now your Notices can look like this, and function exactly like you’d hope they would:
Clicking any of the links included in this Notice will allow you to proceed past this Click-Through, even if you don’t click Continue
Notices operate off of the concept of “bypass by completion”. Typically, you must satisfy specific requirements to “complete” the Notice. Yes/No must have a selection of Yes or No. Agreements must be signed with valid Username and Password (or email address for SSO). Block Notices have no condition for completion, so they function as an impassable wall.
Prior to this change, Click-Through Notices were only considered “complete” if you clicked the Continue button. While that option is still available (using the “Require Button Click” option), the default considers viewing the Notice a completion. This means that testers can proceed on their path by clicking any link in the Notice instead of being required to click the Continue button. Pretty darn cool, huh?
Hello First Name, My Old Friend
"Hi there!” Ugh… boring, right?
Customizing Onboarding emails is an essential component of building interest in your emails - it makes them feel far more personal and “for you.” Following this best practice, you’re hopefully using Dynamic Tags to personalize your emails sent from your Centercode implementation.
In this release, we’ve extended the ability to personalize email communication to Onboarding by building a special Dynamic Tag that lives in Onboarding Emails. For this tag to work for inviting both unknown candidates (to create accounts) and existing Community accounts, we have to account for recipients for whom we don’t yet have any information. So, if your implementation has a First Name for the intended recipient (they already have an account), the system will fill in their name. Otherwise, your fallback, or “Default Value,” takes the lead.
Using this new tag, %%firstname|Default Value%%, you can connect a little more closely to your users in your project invites.
Replace Default Value with something friendly as a fallback, just in case the user doesn’t already have an account.
Opt-Outs via Aupt-Omation
A common request we’ve received for user account removal done within the Centercode platform to be flagged as an Opt-Out instead of a standard account deletion.
Ensuring your CV environment is clear of opt-out accounts and that their data appropriately removed or marked as opted-out can be a critical distinction considering recent evolution of data privacy regulations. Keeping close track of user accounts between multiple systems (including properly flagging removals as opt-outs) is often a key component of account administration, especially in the case of communities using Single Sign-On or when incorporating marketing engagement or user research into your customer validation network.
Check the box to count these user account removals as Opt-Outs
As a bonus to treating these user removals as opt-outs, you can leverage this automation to further build your Opt-Out Dashboard! Not sure what the Opt-Out Dashboard is? Check out the documentation on help.centercode.com!
Customize Report Distributions
We’ve been hearing for a while now that some customers need to omit or specifically select which files are included in your standard Report Distributions. If you’re one of these customers, then your wait is over! Whether you’re stuck behind file-size limitations of your company’s email network, or you just want to minimize any superfluous data leaving your Centercode platform, you can now specifically choose which standard file attachments are included in your automated distributions.
A subheading under Additional Options, checkboxes for distributed files default on but can be checked off at-will
Clone a Feedback Type. Yes, All of It.
This one seems like a simple improvement, and for the most part it is, but we’ve extended the capabilities of Feedback Type Cloning (creating a new Feedback Type and using an existing one as a Template) to incorporate every component of the source Template. Resolving a gap around Workflow and Advanced Destinations, this means that cloning a Feedback Type now includes:
- Basic Properties and Collaboration Settings - From the Name and Prefix to Public-by-Default settings
- The Feedback Form - Every form element and their individual settings
- Access Control - Access to collaborative discussions, administrative tools, and every element via Roles
- Workflow and Statuses - Every preconfigured step in the submission and administrative process
- Advanced Destinations - Any outbound integration connections triggered by Workflow stages
- Resources - Filters, Views, and Macros reassociated to the new Feedback Type
- Automation and Integrations - Automation schedules and triggers, plus enhanced integration configs
Project Introduction Massaging
Many customers have indicated that their Project Introduction Messages (configured under the Project Template tool in Project Tools) hold crucial information for administrators, guiding them through major milestones in their projects or to essential tools used for managing their projects. That sounds suuuuuuper handy! It would be a shame if someone accidentally hid the Message when they actually still needed the information!
To resolve this potential challenge, we’ve added a button to the Layout Mode interface, allowing anyone with Project Tools access to re-open their Project Template Message if they’ve happened to close it.
Did you break your Project Introduction Message? Are you lost without it? Click the Layout button and scroll down!
Bug Fixes and Other Improvements
The 16-5 release includes two specific bug fixes that align with the delivery of this release, but we’ve also thrown in four patches since C16-4 in August. That’s a patch per week, and the platform just keeps getting better and better. The list below provides customer-submitted bugs and minor feature improvements we’ve deployed since then.
Improvements / Feature Changes
- Continued UI refinements focused primarily on Filter and View pages and the Feedback interfaces.
- Scheduled Reports will no longer automatically adjust their schedules if they fail to complete within the hour they're scheduled (due to the generation queue) - they'll attempt to execute at the time you originally selected instead of when they were last successfully completed.
- Unlink functionality added for End-user Visual Editor created Links.
Filters & Views
- A momentary redirect was removed when modifying Filters or Views in Chrome browsers.
- Team-Type Filters will once again apply to User Management filtered lists.
Form Engine
- Matrix form element cells will now consistently match one another in size regardless of text length.
- Matrix form element textual column headings will now wrap and break on available word spacing.
Notices
- Content and Release Availability will now respect Time added to the Date field.
- The use-cases for Click-Through Notices are now waaaay more comprehensive than they used to be - make sure you think about how you can use the new functionality!
Reporting
- The PDF generation process was adjusted to increase resiliency and prevent nasty File Server Errors.
- Report Elements within Feedback Macro Reports can once again be modified after their initial creation.
- Building a Complete Task Report will no longer lead to an error.
- User Scores below zero are now sorted properly when viewed in User Management and Reporting.
- Scheduled Macros and Reports will now return to their originally scheduled time as opposed to auto-adjusting as processing queues stack up.
- Emailed Reports will once again include PDF and Excel files as Distributions do.
- Jira links in Reporting spreadsheets will now link off to the matching Jira ticket.
- NPS Reporting element style with "Show Details" on will once again function as expected.
User Interface
- For sites with no API Keys visible, a Javascript error was corrected on the Project Settings page.
- Distributed Values with multiple values per user allowed will now display as intended on that User's summary page.
- A visual issue affecting the header bar in archived projects (encountered after a Chrome update) was fixed.
Onboarding
- Referral Onboarding Source limits are now respected properly when only 1 invite remains.
- Are you actually reading these bug-fix notes? That’s awesome! Let your CSM know!
WYSIWYG
- Corrected a cache issue with the Centercode Visual Editor that could occur until browser cache was cleared or refreshed.
- The right-click menu in Admin and End-user Visual Editors are now presented appropriately to their use.
Miscellaneous / Performance
- We've improved linking to multiple files attached in Legacy Forums via BBCode.
- Tony got a new keyboard, so he types faster but with a few more errors than usual.