Introduction > Introduction

Welcome to the manual for this comprehensive program for Market Research.

This documentation is updated to version 26.1.3

When using the program press function key F1 to get relevant help.

See Companion suite for a description of the Companion programs and what they are for.

For running CL script files, see Running a CL script and the CL Window.

For CATI you need a CATI licence and use Telin for data entry.

UNI files (with a .uni extension) are treated differently starting with version 24.1, see Fixed format data files for type details.

Recent changes

Some features for larger projects, including running CL scripts, require an extended licence, see:

Extended facilities

For users of the deprecated QPSMR Classic programs (Insight, and CATI), please read:

Classic users

Classic grid tables will now run unchanged in Companion.

Licence free facilities

Anyone can download the software and use the free facilities:

•Analyse data with Tables setup, Quick tables and Drill down using a supplied Reflect database (.qrf or .qrfx)

•Input data using a supplied Input file (.qpsmrinp)

•Check triple-s standard files

•View and edit raw data files (character, binary, .csv, spreadsheet, or .xml)

•Format tables in Excel (OpenXML) produced by QPSMR CL and MRDCL

•Use the built in CL preprocessor

•Export project details to other software

There are also the license free Companion programs:

•Companion Reflect which replaces QPSMR Reflect for end user analysis

•Companion Input which replaces QPSMR Input

•Companion Input Android which can also be used to enter data

Environment

The Companion program:

•Runs on Microsoft Windows 64 bit:

oWindows 11

oWindows 10

oWindows 8 Pro (not RT)

oWindows 7

•Windows 32 bit versions are available on request.

•Is written entirely in the C# language (pronounced "See Sharp") except for the CL engine and Telin which are written in C++.

•Uses the .NET Framework (sometimes written as dotnet)

•Is fully Unicode and can handle any mix of languages (except with binary data files)

The Microsoft .NET Framework which is included with recent versions of Windows and can be downloaded from Download .NET Framework .

Note: When running tables the preprocessor is built into the Companion; the remainder of tables production uses a generated CL script.

Benefits of .NET

C# and the .NET Framework give the following benefits to the program:

•robust

•secure

•future proof

•easy to maintain

•handles any language text

Documentation

This introduction contains the following topics:

Program description

Manual structure

The remainder of the manual consists of:

User Guide

Reference Manual

The Reference Manual also contains a list of Internet web resources.