Column mapping

Before it can answer a spreadsheet questionnaire, ResponseHub has to work out what each column is for — which one holds the question, which one your answer should be written into, and which sheets to skip entirely.

It does this automatically. You only see the mapping screen when it isn’t confident, or when something about the file needs your judgement.

The columns

Column	Holds
Questions	The question text. Required.
Answers (Text)	Where your written answer is placed.
Answers (Yes/No)	Where a yes or no response is placed.
ID	The questionnaire’s own reference for each question.
Guidance	Any notes or guidance the customer supplied with a question.
Multiple choice	The permitted responses, where a question restricts them.

Not every questionnaire has all of these, and a mapping doesn’t need to be complete to work — but a question column is essential, and without an answer column there is nowhere to write the response.

Reviewing the mapping

The mapping screen lists each sheet in the workbook with what it found. Sheets it is confident about are marked as needing no action. Anything else is flagged with the reason:

Issue	Means
Unable to locate question column	No column looks like the questions.
Unable to locate answer column	Nowhere to write a text answer.
Unable to locate yes-no column	Nowhere to write a yes/no answer.
Uncertain column mapping	The headers were ambiguous — check them.
Unsure whether to disregard the sheet	It may be a cover sheet or reference tab rather than questions.

You can set any column yourself, and mark a sheet as Disregarded so it is skipped — useful for instructions, glossaries, and cover sheets.

When the mapping looks right, save it and continue.

Formula columns

Some questionnaires calculate values with formulas — a scoring column, or a summary that reads from the answers.

Answers cannot be written into a column containing formulas. Doing so would overwrite the formulas and corrupt the exported workbook, so ResponseHub flags it and asks you to choose another column. The warning names the column and how many formula cells it found.

If the only sensible answer column contains formulas, the way round it is:

Add a new, empty column to the spreadsheet.
Map the answer to that empty column.
Answer and export the questionnaire as normal.
In the exported file, copy the answers across into the original column yourself.

That keeps the customer’s formulas intact while still giving ResponseHub somewhere to write.

Changing the mapping later

If you spot a mistake after the questions have been generated, select Update mapping to go back to the mapping screen.

Once you select Answer all questions, the mapping is locked and cannot be changed at all.