Draft web form disappeared

Hi there, one of the users (nuna) of zahleschool’s projects spent ages filling out a Quarterly Report form on her laptop (so via Enketo I think??). She was unable to submit it and we were going to investigate why. She logged in a few times and could see the draft there each time so it was saved. Now we went to try to find out what the submission problem was and the form has disappeared. I have logged in as her and can’t find a trace of it. Any ideas on where it could be and how we might be able to retrieve it. This was the user’s first time of using Kobo after coaching to help her through technophobia, so it will be a disaster if all her work has been lost. Many thanks in advance for your ideas.

Welcome back to the community, @sanctuaryinchi! The best and easiest way to find her form would be by opening the same browser the user had used to fill the form and then pasting the survey link there. You can find the draft there if the browser was not cleared. If the cache of the memory was cleared, then you will not be able to get the draft.

Thanks but the form link just takes me to the Form page on a user’s dashboard, not a form (filled as draft or blank). Where would drafts be if they were there? Where can I find them? I tried filling a form in as another user, saved the draft, could not see it anywhere. I then click to open the form again and get this message:

Unsaved Record Found

Enketo has found an unsaved record. Would you like to load this record or discard it?

I click the ‘Load Record’ button and a blank form comes up with none of the data I saved in drafts. I and my colleagues are at a loss as to where drafts are being saved, if indeed they are being saved.

@sanctuaryinchi, there are a couple of things you should be careful of when checking this back:

  • You will need to use the same browser used before for data collection. Using other browsers will not work here.
  • The cache of the browser should not be cleared. Doing so will remove all the traces, and you will not be able to access your forms (saved unsent to the server).

So in your case, I assume that the browser was cleared.

It really wasn’t cleared. We have tested, as described above, and drafts we save don’t show anywhere. This is as soon as they are saved. There is no opportunity for the cache to be cleared. Multiple users are having the same problem. Are we missing something obvious here? Where would drafts show if they had saved properly?

@sanctuaryinchi, in this case, I assume the form was not saved then. Maybe you closed the browser before it saved.

This is absolutely not the case, as described above. We have tested this several times with different users, saving the draft then being unable to find where it is or retrieve it. We are saving drafts; we are not clearing the cache. How can we locate the drafts? What are we missing here?

@sanctuaryinchi, would you mind sharing with me the following information through a private message so that I could have a closer look at your case:

  • Username
  • Project name
  • Server

Note: You could share with me a private message as outlined in the post discussed previously:

@sanctuaryinchi, could you also share with me the browser your team has been using to collect data (where the draft has disappeared)? This should also help us troubleshoot your issue.

Hi @sanctuaryinchi, the drafts are stored in the browser’s local database called “Indexed DB”. Locating this will depend on your browser, but in my case in Firefox, I will go to the Web Developer Tools > Storage > Indexed DB and then navigate the drop-downs until I find “records”. There you will see Keys and Values that hold the data for the draft records. Note that you need to be at the URL for Enketo depending on which server you used (https://ee.kobotoolbox.org or https://ee.humanitarianresponse.info):

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@Kal_Lam and @Josh I have a user who gets this error when they try to upload the draft, please advise.

Dear @Kal_Lam Same issue im facing so can you please help im login with users account and over there i cant see my draft form so please help understand this. Thank you.

Hi Kal,
I am writing to you concerning my lost draft forms on Kobocollect offline form that I had filled using the chrome browser. I have tried everything solution that was mentioned in the community forum with no success at all.

Please help me recover the forms I am so scared what might happen to me if I loose all the data I collected :pensive:

@Kal_Lam Please I need your support to recover lost draft forms on Kobocollect offline form that I had filled using the chrome browser. I have tried every solution that was mentioned in the community forum with no success at all.

Please help me recover the forms I am so scared what might happen to me if I loose all the data I collected

Thanks in advance!