Today, we began rolling out v2.71.2 of the SurveyCTO server console. This is a minor release that includes a series of performance, ease-of-use, and security improvements, and it will be automatically rolled out to all SurveyCTO servers in the coming weeks.
If your server hasn’t been updated yet, you can choose to manually update at any time. Just log in to manage your subscription and use the green button at the top of the page to update your server. Otherwise, your server will be updated automatically within the next few weeks (and all server administrators will receive an email notification).
Here’s a brief summary of what’s included in the release:
- Performance: We’ve made some major improvements for server console users who work with very large datasets. We’ve reduced the amount of browser memory required to load or export data, so more data can be loaded or exported without the browser slowing down or freezing up, and exporting will continue in the background if you switch to another window or browser tab.
- Ease-of-use: Rather than starting with a blank canvas when you open a new workbook to monitor or explore your data, the Data Explorer will now start you off with a helpful mix of default field summaries. And for users new to the platform, it’s easier now to add an example form and jump straight in to explore its sample data; every empty server, team, or form group now offers the option, and the example form can be added to the same server multiple times.
- Security: We’ve dramatically strengthened default security settings for new servers, including enabling all mobile security settings by default (including, e.g., requiring device encryption and dedicated workspaces); anybody who prefers not to set such a high security bar can still disable those settings when needed, or override them for specific user roles. We also began defaulting API access to disabled for all new user roles, and phased out the old Require private workspace storage setting in favor of the newer and more-comprehensive Don’t allow any outside access setting. Finally, we began requiring mobile users to be using a modern and supported version of SurveyCTO Collect, unless a new mobile security setting is disabled.
The release also includes a series of other, smaller improvements. You can find all of them listed in the release notes.
