Edit a profile variable

Correct misspellings in a profile variable's name, description, or values. You can also change the name of an old profile variable if you want to use the name for a new one.

This task updates a profile variable or its values for all members. If you need to edit profile variable values for one member, you can do so through their member details.

For information on editing Calculated Date profile variables, see Edit a Calculated Date profile variable.

Note: This task cannot be performed by Author or Analyst users.
  1. Open the Community app and click Community > Profile Variables at the top of the page.
  2. Click a profile variable.
  3. Optional: In the Profile Variables dialog, change the Variable Name.
    Note:
    • The variable name cannot:
      • Exceed 400 characters (including spaces).
      • Contain commas.
      • Use the same name as a removed profile variable.
      • Use the names of reserved system variables as a profile variable name:
        • begindate
        • communityid
        • datasettype
        • enddate
        • memberid
        • panelid
        • password
        • salt
        • statusupdatedby
        • statusupdateddate
    • The dialog only shows 300 values. For more information, see View profile variables.
    • If you are using scripting in a power survey to get and post profile variables, changing Variable Name after the power survey is live will break this functionality. You must update the scripts with the new profile variable names.
  4. Optional: Edit the Description.
  5. Optional: Click the Category drop-down list and select or deselect the categories to associate with the profile variable, as required.
    Note: The Category drop-down list is only available if at least one category has been created on the Manage Categories page.
  6. Optional: Select Treat this profile variable as sensitive data.

    This option controls whether the application purges personally identifiable information stored as part of this profile variable's data, for members who have become inactive. This option is available for the following profile variable types:

    • Text
    • Date
    • Number
    • Identity

    System variables such as FirstName, LastName, and email are flagged as sensitive data by default. For more information, see Sensitive data.

    Note: Admins can change this setting. To change this setting as a Power User, you must have Can access sensitive data enabled.
  7. Optional: Edit the Variable Values.
    Note: To prevent data loss, you cannot remove profile variable values when you edit them. However, you can disable profile variable values that are no longer in use.
  8. Optional: Change the order of the profile variable values.

    • Click the options menu beside a value, and select Move up or Move down.

    • Hover over the left side of a profile variable value until your cursor becomes a crosshair, and drag the value into the desired position.

    Note: Do not reorder profile variable values by switching text strings. For example, in the following image, if you type Female where Male is and vice versa, the switch will adversely affect member data by switching member values for Gender.

    Always use drag-and-drop or the options menu.

  9. Optional: Disable or restore profile variable values.
  10. When you are finished, click Save.

Editing the text strings in a profile variable's name, description, or values does not break anything that references the profile variable (for example, survey logic or a report filter). However, keep these considerations in mind:

  • If a profile variable has been renamed but a CSV import uses the old profile variable name, the application will create a new profile variable under the old name upon import, instead of merging the values into the renamed profile variable.

    For example, if you rename a profile variable from City to Hometown in the application and your CSV import contains a profile variable called City, the application creates a new City profile variable instead of using the values under City to update the values under Hometown.

  • The formatting of profile variable names and values in a CSV import does not override the formatting entered through the Profile Variables page.

    For example, if your CSV import has City values spelled toronto, vancouver, and montreal but they were spelled Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal when the profile variable was first created, the values will be merged and imported as Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal.