1. What is the issue? Please be detailed.
There are differences in values that are recorded / shown in notes / included in calculated strings / submitted to Central, depending on where the form is completed and whether it's manual or uses a default from now()/today().
Some may be intentional, but they can cause different sorts of values being returned, eg a field that starts with default current time in WF will be HH:MM:SS but allows user modification will also include ms & TZ offset when changed (user cannot enter ms or TZ). And if the value is calculated to another field (join/concat/coalesce) Collect will lose all time data from time and datetime fields.
Functionality
- WF - cannot use
now()directly in atimequestion, must use it withformat-time(). There is notime()function. - WF - default time with
HH:MM:SSformatting (only hrs/min/sec) will be different to value from entered H:M:S time (hrs/min/sec/ms/TZ) (Enketo does include 0ms and local TZ offset). Can use%3to include ms ticks but no option in docs for TZ offset. - Collect - field values displayed in a note strips all time data for time or datetime fields
- Enketo/WF - ms is only captured for auto datetime, not auto time / manual time or datetime, these all have
.000. - Collect - ms is not captured for any field, all are
.000
Calculated value using fields:
- Enketo - auto and manual time/datetime formats in concat all include ms and TZ offset. OK
- Collect - auto and manual time/datetime values in concat only have date value, time/TZ all stripped eg;
auto date: 2026-09-21 auto time: 2026-09-21 auto datetime: 2026-09-21 manual date: 2026-09-01 manual time: 2026-09-21 manual datetime: 2026-09-04
- WF - auto time in concat only has seconds. manual time/datetime and auto datetime all have ms and TZ
Uploaded value
- All - time & datetime field values, default and user selected in Central display with no ms or TZ content, assue this is for clarity as fields in CSV include ms/TZ, excluding calculated fields from Collect and WF auto time.
2. What steps can we take to reproduce this issue?
Try the attached form.
auto+manual dates+times.xlsx (54.0 KB)
4. Upload any forms or screenshots you can share publicly below.
Fields used in a note to display values:
Screenshot of Enketo
Screenshot of WF
Screenshot of Collect - note complete lack of time value
