Digital Test Deck®

A Digital Test Deck^® (DTD) is a set of special test materials that may be used to test all modes or channels of a data capture system.  Multi-mode testing is important because the mode of data capture may significantly alter the respondent’s answers.

For the Paper Mode, either image or paper test material is utilized that is simulated, but yet realistically representative of human respondents.  It is also internally consistent and may be created in large enough volumes as to be statistically significant.  Realistic business rules such as household relationships or the context of age and date of birth are engineered into this next generation of test material for automated testing of system workflow processes.  These decks have perfectly known answers with the ability to test for OCR, OMR or keying errors.

For the Telephone Mode, a Digital Test Deck^® is created in the correct file format for system load or stress testing or is transferred to a neutral respondent script for reading to a telephone operator for independent establishment of error rates during interviews.

For Internet or Computer Assisted Personal Interviews Modes, a Digital Test Deck^® is typically large data files for system load testing and error rate measurement.