surveydown

Spec sheet

Purpose

surveydown is an open-source platform for creating programmable, markdown-based surveys with Quarto, Shiny, and PostgreSQL.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Intended users

The FAQ says it may suit people comfortable with Quarto and basic coding who want reproducible collaboration, and may not suit those requiring polished, mature software or a guaranteed security level such as HIPAA compliance.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Integrations

The documented stack includes Quarto, Shiny, PostgreSQL, and recommended Supabase; surveys can be deployed to Posit Connect Cloud, Hugging Face Spaces, or Google Cloud Run.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Support

The FAQ directs users to GitHub issues for bugs or documentation problems and GitHub discussions for questions, feature requests, and project sharing.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Compliance limitation

The project says it does not yet provide a security compliance certificate and cannot guarantee SOC 2 Type 2 or HIPAA compliance for its application code.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Custom branding

YesRead 22 Sep 2026 · surveydown.org

Data dashboard

The studio Responses tab shows statistics and charts, previews response data, and offers CSV download.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Data storage

Responses can be stored in PostgreSQL, with database, preview, and local modes available.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Database integrations

Responses are stored in PostgreSQL, and the documentation recommends Supabase while allowing any PostgreSQL service.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Deployment requirement

A live survey is a Shiny application and must be hosted on a service that runs R; static hosts such as GitHub Pages and Netlify are unsuitable.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Hosting

Surveys are live Shiny applications and must run on an R-capable host; documented options include Posit Connect Cloud, Hugging Face Spaces, Google Cloud Run, and self-hosted Posit Connect.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Hosting considerations

The security page says shinyapps.io is not HIPAA compliant and recommends operating Posit Connect or Shiny Server for users who need a HIPAA-compliant hosting environment.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Logic branching

YesRead 22 Sep 2026 · surveydown.org

Operating modes

Surveys support database, preview, and local modes, with preview and local modes storing data locally.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Question features

Documented question types include text, numeric, multiple choice, image choice, sliders, dates, and matrix inputs.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Reproducibility

The project says its code-based survey content supports reproducibility and version control with tools such as Git.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Security certification

The project says it does not currently provide a security compliance certificate and cannot guarantee compliance with standards such as SOC 2 Type 2 or HIPAA.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Security practices

The project says it uses SQL injection prevention strategies and recommends keeping database credentials in a .env file excluded through .gitignore.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Survey authoring

Survey content is written in a Quarto document using Markdown and R code, with app settings and server configuration in an R script.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Survey design

Survey content is authored in a Quarto document using Markdown and R code, with app settings defined in an R script.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Survey logic

The package supports conditional question and page display, forward skipping, and other survey control options.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Survey studio

The companion sdstudio package launches a locally run Shiny app for editing, previewing, and monitoring surveys.Read 12 Oct 2026 · surveydown.org

Where Specifiction places it

• Survey Software#119 of 1317.1