Like a word document

I started my working life working with computers, not anything special you might think except at the time computers filled rooms and were locked behind security doors and hidden from most peoples view.

I was however fortunate to land a job that used Digital Equipment Corporation(DEC) computers and while many other computer operators at that time had to feed their machines with punch cards I instructed the machine through the use of online command files compiled using online editors.

So having been brought up on online editors that later spawned sophisticated word-processors I would find it very hard now to write a letter with pen and paper as my entire thought process is based on the ability to cut and paste and move sentences around. As such I will often write a report from the middle out, getting my thoughts down knowing that I will be able to go back at a later stage to hone a sentence and write a snappy introduction and maybe a summary or conclusion. The point I'm making is that I don't write letters or articles by starting at the begining and ending at the end.

Similarly when preparing surveys online I rarely write the survey sequentially. I will instead cut to the heart of the survey knowing that I will be able to move items around, insert and remove as the design of the survey develops.

In particular I will only include demographic type questions to-wards the end of the design process. This is mainly because I make use of the Survey Galaxy library features to allow me to 'drop' a number of standard demographic questions into a survey and so it allows me to keep the survey design slim while composing making it easier to manipulate.

When first designing surveys I used to prepare them using a word processor but I soon found this to be a pointless exercises as I find it much easier to use the Survey Galaxy composer from the onset as it gently reminds you of the mandatory and optional parameters applicable to each type of question/answer format.

With the ability to switch between answer formats, move items around and having a dynamic display showing the effects of all changes I would certainly recommend that anyone coming fresh to online surveys learns that writing the survey sequentially from the first to the last may not always be best.

Relax and have fun knowing that rearranging and modifying surveys is quick and easy. Don't get writers block - not sure of the exact wording put something down and move on, then go back to the question later when you are likely to have found your writing rhythm.