20636: Ranking type question save answers in a single database column

This issue affects 1 person(s).

ID	Project	Category	View Status	Date Submitted	Last Update
20636	Bug reports	Database design	public	2026-08-06 10:03	2026-08-06 13:30

Reporter	shouri75	Assigned To	tibor.pacalat
Priority	none	Severity	minor
Status	closed	Resolution	won't fix
Product Version	7.0.x

Summary	20636: Ranking type question save answers in a single database column
Description	All answer codes are stored in a single combined text string, each rounded by " and separated by comma, instead of creating a separate database column for each rank position, even though "Maximum columns for ranking (max_subquestions)" is set to the total number of answer options the question contains
Steps To Reproduce	Steps to reproduce Create a survey Add a rank type question with 71 possible choices Set "Maximum columns for ranking (max_subquestions)" to 71 Activate survey Answer survey Expected result 71 separated database columns, one for each rank position Actual result A single column containing combined text string
Tags	No tags attached.

Bug heat	4
Complete LimeSurvey version number (& build)	7.0.7+260729
I will donate to the project if issue is resolved	No
Story point estimate	0
Browser	Google Chrome
Database type & version	MariaDB 10.11.18
Server OS (if known)
Webserver software & version (if known)	nginx/1.30.4
PHP Version	8.4.22

User List	shouri75

Date Modified	Username	Field	Change
2026-08-06 10:03	shouri75	New Issue
2026-08-06 10:06	shouri75	Issue Monitored: shouri75
2026-08-06 10:06	shouri75	Bug heat	0 => 2
2026-08-06 12:48	tibor.pacalat	Note Added: 85377
2026-08-06 12:48	tibor.pacalat	Bug heat	2 => 4
2026-08-06 13:30	tibor.pacalat	Note Edited: 85377
2026-08-06 13:30	tibor.pacalat	Assigned To	=> tibor.pacalat
2026-08-06 13:30	tibor.pacalat	Status	new => closed
2026-08-06 13:30	tibor.pacalat	Resolution	open => won't fix

tibor.pacalat 2026-08-06 12:48 administrator ~85377 Last edited: 2026-08-06 13:30	We changed the column type of ranking question responses to JSON. Maximum columns for answers is obsolete and need to be removed. I have created a task internally to do this.