What are the cheapest options for simple, but user-friendly data entry?

Asked by coelacanth (222

) April 7th, 2012

Right now all I have is an smartphone, which is cheap (because I don’t have to buy another device), but not user-friendly (because it’s so small).

Perhaps there are good apps for Android for user-friendly data entry (i.e. a simple spreadsheet app that you can easily enter data into cells and maneuver through many rows of data) that I don’t know about.

Or perhaps there are mobile devices that are already made for such simple tasks. I’m talkin’ like two columns and a few hundred rows of data max per project.

This is the only use I would have for this device, so it need be nothing fancy.

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5 Answers

A pen and paper in the field, excel later. Is this not an option? If not, get a tablet PC.

wallabies (1081

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I mean clearly that’s an option, and is what I do now, but my goal is to reduce duplicate data entry.

The requirements “cheap” and “simple” exclude gadgets like tablet PCs and iPads.

EDIT: Ha, I just realized I forgot to include “mobile” in my question title (“mobile data entry”). What a doofus.

coelacanth (222

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Google Docs lets you create web forms which write results to a Google docs spreadsheet.

http://www.google.com/google-d-s/forms/

jaytkay (25810

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@jaytkay, GDoc forms aren’t customizable enough. If the Google Docs spreadsheets were user-friendly on smartphone-sized devices I would use that option.

coelacanth (222

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How about going to a university nearest you, and visiting a department that might do a lot of field research, such as botany, zoology, plant pathology, ecology, sociology, maybe even genetics and asking the researchers there what products/software/applications do they use?

2davidc8 (10189

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