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Ask HN: Would you benefit from a GitHub like survey tool?

3 points by cocobolo ↗ HN
I like survey tools from some reason, Typeform and sruveymonkey. It helps in collecting data on a wide range of tasks from market research to planning trips. What is lacking in these tools is its "closedness", there is a lot of data out there that could be useful to many but with a limited view. I want to therefore build a tool that is completely based on the sharing model. Your suggestions as always are valuable.

4 comments

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diggan
I'm not sure if I understand what "closedness" means for you. Basically, you would like to build a platform for creating surveys/forms and then all the surveys/forms would share the data between them, creating data that is open for everyone?

Would this be a completely open project or something you're planning to monetize?

Quick disclaimer, I work at Typeform

cocobolo
@diggan, hello. Apologies for the english. I'm not sure what you mean by "sharing data between them". What I really meant was survey whose results are accessible to everyone, I understand that some surveys like HR surveys are meant to be private, but for many other people would like to know what other people have answered in certain surveys like market research.

I have not even begun sketching this project yet, but I would have to consider both options for the kind of path this project would take.

Since you work at Typeform, I would like to ask a few questions(If you are willing). I'm not a heavy typeform user so some points might not be relevant.

I understand that Typeform is mostly centered towards the UX, but could it be beneficial to add feature for a markdown like syntax as an alternative to WYSIWYG, partly because I'm a power user and otherwise the interface is too laggy.

As far as reporting/analytics goes, Typeform is not very useful. I would love to see something like cross-tabs where you can cross multiple metrics to derive data. Yes writing a generic solution would be hard for this problem I think! it would be great to see something like this. As otherwise it is difficult to derive answers for questions like, what is the % of people who like trekking and would love to go to the moon?

This would be another benefit of using textual syntax, as users can point out with the DSL what metrics can be crossed and what cannot be.

This is just my feedback! I have a some other points, I would be happy to answer any queries you have and would love to hear what you have to say.

Have a great day.

diggan
No worries about the language, at this point, I think I understand what you're out after...

We have a API that is currently in MVP stage (very early) that you can access to create typeforms by POSTing JSON to our endpoint. You can get access to it today by going here: http://typeform.io/landing/

We think that by leveraging the creation of typeforms and collection of results via API, you can build your own, customized backend on top of Typeform I/O and you'll be able to do all the things you're looking for.

Shoot me an email at victor@typeform.com if you have any questions you'd like to discuss privately. Otherwise, I hope I answered your questions.

cocobolo
Thanks! I think that makes sense. I should definitely check this out.