You can download your survey results in several formats. perlQ currently supports the following download options for your results:

CSV (Comma Separated Value)
The comma separated file format is one of the most popular methods of exchanging data between different programs. This can be read in by many popular software programs such as Microsoft Excel and Access. Each survey response is placed on one line (unless the results contain newlines themselves), with each answer separated by commas (and enclosed in double quotes if necessary). There is also a header row on the data that contains the column names (such as "IP Address" or the question that was asked).

XML (Extensible Markup Language)
You can download survey results in valid XML, which is similar to HTML. This format is meant to be easily read by humans or machines (such as a program) and can be combined with style sheets to format the results to your liking. A brief description of the format of our XML file can be found the user documentation. Warning: This file can become very large with many survey results, as the questions and answers are shown for each response.

XML Condensed (Extensible Markup Language; Machine Readable)
This representation of the survey results is also in valid XML, but is often around 25% the size of the above XML format. This format is not meant to be easily read by humans, but contains all of the survey information, including page breaks. This would allow you to use this file if you are planning on building applications to parse your results.

SQL (Structured Query Language)
If you choose to download the results in the SQL format, you will end up with a series of INSERT statements which you can use to place your data into the appropriate SQL tables. Because the answers remain unprocessed and difficult for a human to decifer, this is mostly useful for backing up a single survey along with all results. To backup the data in a perlQ compatible format, check out the 'perlQQuestionnaire Backup Format' listed below.

Processed Excel Results for Graphing Purposes
We have also included an option that allows you to download the results processed into a basic Excel compatible format (simple HTML tables). It displays the results for all multiple choice questions with tabulated results from which you can easily create charts and graphs. No results for textfield or textarea answers will be shown.

perlQuestionnaire Backup Format
This file will contain all of your survey questions and results should you ever find the need to restore this data due to a new installation, a corrupted database or a crashed hard drive. Keep in mind that this is the only file format listed here that disregards whether you click on 'Verified', 'Unverified' or 'All' results for an email verified survey. All data from the specified survey will be backed up regardless of the button clicked.

More information can be found in the documentation included with perlQ.