ODK Collect

ODK Collect is an Android app for filling out forms. It is designed to be used in resource-constrained environments with challenges such as unreliable connectivity or power infrastructure. ODK Collect is part of Open Data Kit (ODK), a free and open-source set of tools which help organizations author, field, and manage mobile data collection solutions. Learn more about the Open Data Kit project and its history here and read about example ODK deployments here.

ODK Collect renders forms that are compliant with the ODK XForms standard, a subset of the XForms 1.1 standard with some extensions. The form parsing is done by the JavaRosa library which Collect includes as a jar.

• ODK website: https://opendatakit.org
• ODK Collect usage instructions: https://opendatakit.org/use/collect
• ODK community mailing list: http://groups.google.com/group/opendatakit
• ODK developer mailing list: http://groups.google.com/group/opendatakit-developers
• ODK developer Slack chat: http://slack.opendatakit.org
• ODK developer Slack archive: http://opendatakit.slackarchive.io
• ODK developer wiki: https://github.com/opendatakit/opendatakit/wiki

Release cycle

New versions of ODK Collect are released on the last Sunday of each month. We freeze commits to the master branch on the preceding Wednesday (except for bug fixes).

Testing a form locally

1. Make or get (example forms, test forms) an XLSForm.

2. Convert the XLSForm (xlsx) to XForm (xml). Use the ODK website or XLSForm Offline or pyxform.

3. Once you have the XForm, use adb to push the form to your device (after enabling USB debugging) or emulator.

   adb push my_form.xml /sdcard/odk/forms/
   

4. Launch ODK Collect and tap Fill Blank Form. The new form will be there.

Setting up your development environment

1. Download and install Git and add it to your PATH

2. Download and install Android Studio

3. Fork the collect project (why and how to fork)

4. Clone your fork of the project locally. At the command line:

    git clone https://github.com/YOUR-GITHUB-USERNAME/collect
   

If you prefer not to use the command line, you can use Android Studio to create a new project from version control using https://github.com/YOUR-GITHUB-USERNAME/collect.

1. Open the project in the folder of your clone from Android Studio. To run the project, click on the green arrow at the top of the screen. The emulator is very slow so we generally recommend using a physical device when possible.

Using APIs for local development

To run functionality that makes API calls from your debug-signed builds, you may need to get an API key or otherwise authorize your app.

Google Drive API - Follow the instructions in the "Generate the signing certificate fingerprint and register your application" section from here. Enable the Google Drive API here.

Google Maps API - Follow the instructions here. Please be sure not to commit your personal API key to a branch that you will submit a pull request for.

Contributing code

Any and all contributions to the project are welcome. ODK Collect is used across the world primarily by organizations with a social purpose so you can have real impact!

Issues tagged as quick win should be a good place to start. There are also currently many issues tagged as needs reproduction which need someone to try to reproduce them with the current version of ODK Collect and comment on the issue with their findings.

If you're ready to contribute code, see the contribution guide.

Contributing in other ways

If you know a language other than English, consider contributing translations through Transifex.

You can also help by improving this documentation.

Downloading builds

Per-commit debug builds can be found on CircleCI. Login with your GitHub account, click the build you'd like, then find the APK in the Artifacts tab.

Current and previous production builds can be found on the ODK website.

Troubleshooting

Error when running Robolectric tests from Android Studio on macOS: build/intermediates/bundles/debug/AndroidManifest.xml (No such file or directory)

Configure the default JUnit test runner configuration in order to work around a bug where IntelliJ / Android Studio does not set the working directory to the module being tested. This can be accomplished by editing the run configurations, Defaults -> JUnit and changing the working directory value to $MODULE_DIR$.

Source: Robolectric Wiki.

Android Studio Error: SDK location not found. Define location with sdk.dir in the local.properties file or with an ANDROID_HOME environment variable.

When cloning the project from Android Studio, click "No" when prompted to open the build.gradle file and then open project.