Feature - Attachment Question Type on Online Assessments

Currently, on 3.32.1, when answering Online Assessments, users can add evidence and attachments that support their answers (or are requested by the Assessor/Auditor) only using the Comments & Attachments functionality.

Even though it could work for Authenticated Users, when you activate the new OA setting Enable Non-Authenticated Submissions, Anonymous Users are not able to add attachments in any way (as the Comments & Attachments functionality is reserved only for Authenticated Users)

In addition, it is worth mentioning that the current way of collecting evidence (Comments & Attachments feature) is a bit cumbersome and not very user-friendly, and users often forget to do it and must be reminded.

I suggest introducing a New Question Type specifically for Attachments. When creating a new questionnaire, users could select this question type and prompt respondents to attach relevant evidence and document any other supporting materials directly within the form.

Benefits of the Proposed Feature:

  1. Efficiency and User-Frendly: Users (including on-authenticated users) won’t need to navigate to a separate feature (Comments & Attachments) to upload evidence. It will be seamlessly integrated into the assessment process without additional steps.
  2. Clarity: By explicitly requesting attachments, assessors can ensure that respondents understand the need for supporting materials and provide them.

How It Should Work:

  1. When creating a new questionnaire, users can use the new question type: “Attachments.”
  2. The question prompt could be customizable, allowing auditors to specify the type of evidence required (e.g., screenshots, documents, photos).
  3. Respondents would have the option to upload files directly within the audit conclusion form (if possible with a drag-and-drop functionality as well)
  4. If the OA setting Incomplete Submissions is disabled, users shouldn’t be able to send the form without uploading an attachment.

I believe this enhancement would improve the overall Online Assessment module and make it more efficient for both assessors and respondents.

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I second this request. This feature was the 2nd response from my vendor risk stakeholders after I built and demoed our first vendor questionnaire internally using this module. This 2nd response: “can the vendors upload their supporting certs, docs, etc.” The first response was “awesome!” Requiring the vendors to login is prohibitive for us due to the volume and labor overhead associated with that, and the comments/attachments is not user friendly for non-eramba users/audience (the vendors).

yes this is on the roadmap, low prio for now.

int ref: https://github.com/eramba/eramba/issues/4886

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We need to simplify all this to the following:

  • OA imports have one option that is “Comments & Attachments” where the option is “Comments Only, Attachments Only, Both”
  • Based on the previous setting the OA displays what needs to be displayed
  • Make sure that when a comment & attachment is created, the notification sent has a link to the portal (this will be used by authenticated and non-authenticated users) and one notification to the backend (main portal) that takes you directly to that feedback
  • I think now when a comment is included, the filter is not “highlighting” the counter of comments in red colour so you dont know which item received the comment
  • Comments provided by non-authenticated users must be assigned to the user that was set as “Recipient” of the OA. If more than one user was set then what? … no idea.