mturk-manage.html reproduces some of the basic functionality offered by the Mange HITs individually option removed from the Amazon Mechanical Turk requester interface in December 2017.
This tool is offered without warranty.
The tool broadly replicates the functionality and layout of the discontinued interface, and is designed to be familiar to those who have previous experience managing HITs.
There is nothing to install. The interface runs locally in the browser, and has only three external dependencies, the Amazon AWS SDK, jQuery and jQuery UI, and AlaSQL, which are loaded automatically.
This tool uses a small number of carefully chosen third-party libraries, which are loaded automatically. To minimise the security implications of automatically downloading and including third-party code, all external dependencies include an SHA-512
integrity
property to allow the browser to ensure they have not been tampered with.
To minimise the risk of your credentials being leaked, it is recommended that this tool is used with a browser that supports the Subresource Integrity mechanism. At the time of writing the integrity of external resources is currently validated by Chrome, Firefox, and Opera.
For security reasons, using copies hosted on a web-server is not recommended as they may be subject to tampering and increase the likelihood of your security credentials being intercepted and stolen.
While the management console does not store credentials, or send them to any third-party, you accept all liability for the security of your access credentials when using them with this tool.
Additional guidance on limiting the access of your credentials is offered in the Login section.
Download mturk-manage.html to your local file storage, and open the file in your browser.
The interface runs directly on your computer and untrusted copies, including copies hosted on web-servers, should not be used.
The login page allows you to enter your API key and API secret as used to create and manage tasks. You will need to enter your AWS access key ID and secret access key. e.g.
- Sample access key ID: AKIAIOSFODNN7EXAMPLE
- Sample secret access key: wJalrXUtnFEMI/K7MDENG/bPxRfiCYEXAMPLEKEY
These credentials are examples only, reproduced from the Amazon Mechanical Turk Getting Started Guide, and are non-functional.
These credentials are not the username and password used to login at https://requester.mturk.com. However, your will have likely already generated appropriate security credentials for use with the tools and frameworks currently being used to create your HITs.
The management interface allows you to select either the sandbox, or the production (live) Mechanical Turk service. You may return to the login view by clicking on the Change link in the header at any time.
If your credentials are not valid, you will be returned to the login page to try again. In addition to incorrect credentials, login may fail for a variety of reasons including not having an AmazonMechanicalTurk
access policy attached to the credentials or, when attempting to access the sandbox, not being registered to do so. Please check the browser console to determine why your login may have failed.
While this tool does not store your credentials, it is advisable to create an additional user and access keys to more easily manage access to your Amazon Mechanical Turk account, and other AWS services.
Rather than using your AWS root security credentials, you can create additional users and access keys using the AWS security console. In the event that such credentials are compromised, they can be revoked individually. The use of IAM credentials is recommended.
Instructions for creating and managing IAM users are available from the Amazon Mechanical Turk Getting Started Guide.
If you do not intend to use the interface to modify HITs or assignments in any way (e.g. extend, expire, approve, reject) consider attaching the AmazonMechanicalTurkReadOnly
access policy to the credentials, rather than AmazonMechanicalTurkFullAccess
.
- Note: your IAM user must be using the 2017 version of the
AmazonMechanicalTurkReadOnly
policy (or newer) to allow theListHits
permission.
Once you have logged in, the console lists all HITs currently available for the requester.
Loading activity is indicated using an icon in the top right of the management console, under the Change login link.
Tasks can be filtered using the status links or the search box. The Active status link shows tasks which require further human interaction, the Waiting status link shows just tasks which are waiting for approval or rejection, and the Ended status link shows tasks for which no further interaction is required and may be deleted. These filters update the presented list of tasks, and summary data detailed below, immediately.
- Search text is case-insensitive and space-separated. The search will match the full
HitId
or any other terms visible in each row. - To match multi-word phrases, use double quotes (
"
). e.g. the searchmy task
will matchmy second task
but"my task"
will not. - Search terms can be negated by prefixing them with a single dash (
-
). e.g. the search-"a task"
will hide all rows containing the phrasea task
. - The special keywords
status/active
,status/waiting
, andstatus/ended
can be used to filter by task status.
You may refresh the active view at any time by clicking the in-page refresh icon.
The ID column shows the truncated HitId
. Selecting this link displays the task specific and Assignment management options, detailed in the Manage Assignments section. Hovering over this link displays the full HitId
, HitTypeId
, and HitGroupId
for this task. Despite the truncated display, either a partial or complete *Id
can be used as the search parameter.
For externally hosted tasks, using an ExternalQuestion
, or MTurk hosted HTMLQuestion
tasks a (Preview) link is displayed next to the task title, allowing the task to be easily accessed and viewed. The task is linked as it would be from Amazon Mechanical Turk (including additional URL parameters such as assignmentId=ASSIGNMENT_ID_NOT_AVAILABLE
).
For tasks which have assignments available an (MTurk) link is shown, allowing the task to be easily found and viewed on Amazon Mechanical Turk. Where only pending assignments remain, the link is displayed in grey to indicate that assignments may not be available.
At the overview level, the interface offers the following actions which affect all visible HITs. These actions respect the Active filter or currently set search value.
- Download Data: download a CSV file of answer data grouped by and including
QuestionIdentifier
information and Approval/Rejection information for all visible HITs. Note that timestamps are exported in ISO format.- Amazon: download a CSV file of answer data in the original Amazon format, for compatibility. Note that all timestamps are PST, see Known Issues for more details.
- Delete: delete all visible HITs.
- Note: only HITs which are
Unassignable
, expired or having no available tasks, and for which all assignments have been reviewed may be deleted. Any visible HITs which are ineligible will prevent this action. - Note: a download of all data is forced before final confirmation and actual removal of the HITs.
- Note: only HITs which are
For ease of recognition, HITs are displayed with various background colours depending on HIT status.
Assignable
HITs have outstanding available assignments and are shown with a white background.Unassignable
HITs are complete HITs that require no further user interactions and are shown with a mid-grey background.Unassignable
HITs with unreviewed, submitted assignments are shown with a light-grey background.- This is approximately equivalent to tasks in the
Reviewable
orReviewing
state.
- This is approximately equivalent to tasks in the
Tasks have a number of assignments, Amazon describes the possible status of these assignments as follows:
Pending
assignments for this HIT that are being previewed or have been accepted by WorkersAvailable
assignments for this HIT that are available for Workers to acceptCompleted
assignments for this HIT that have been approved or rejected
The tool also shows the number of Submitted
assignments. These are assignments which have been submitted, but not yet reviewed. When present, these counts are shown parenthesised next to the Pending figures.
Summative summary data is shown above and to the right of the table, for all currently displayed tasks.
Summary data indicates the following data, indicated in the following format T: 0 / P: 0 (+0) / A: 0 (+0) / C: 0
T
number of HITs displayedP
pending assignments, being previewed or currently accepted by workers(+0)
assignments which have been submitted but are yet to be reviewed
A
available assignments(+0)
assignments which would be available had the HIT not already expired, or that will become available if the HIT is extended
C
completed assignments
Hovering the mouse pointer over the relevant letter or parenthesised number in the summary will show tool-tips in most modern browsers.
Summary data is updated in real-time, respecting the currently selected filter (All or Active) or entered search parameters.
The Manage Assignments interface includes both HIT specific management actions and assignment management actions.
You can return the HIT overview list at any time by clicking the Manage HITs header.
At the task level, the interface offers the following actions.
- Download Data: download a CSV file of answer data grouped by and including
QuestionIdentifier
information and Approval/Rejection information. Note that timestamps are exported in ISO format.- Amazon: download a CSV file of answer data in the original Amazon format, for compatibility. Note that all timestamps are PST, see Known Issues for more details.
- Add Time: extend an active HIT, or reactivate an expired one. The extension period is specified as an integer number in either minutes, hours (default), days, or weeks depending on the drop down selection.
- Note: reactivated task expiration is subject to a small error, see Known Issues for more information.
- Add Assignments: add additional assignments to the HIT.
- Note: not all HITs may have additional assignments created, see Known Issues for more information.
- Expire: expire an
Assignable
HIT. - Delete: delete the HIT.
- Note: only HITs which are
Unassignable
, expired or having no available tasks, and for which all assignments have been reviewed may be deleted.
- Note: only HITs which are
Assignments can be filtered by status, Submitted
, Approved
, Rejected
, or All. By default, only the submitted assignments are shown as these require requester attention.
You can refresh the list of assignments at any time by clicking the in-page refresh icon.
The ID column shows the truncated AssignmentId
. Hovering over this link displays the full AssignmentId
.
Assignments are displayed with various background colours depending on their status.
Submitted
assignments are displayed with a white background.Approved
assignments are displayed with a light-grey background.Rejected
assignments are displayed with a light-pink background.
The Time column shows the times of relevant action for each assignment. Note that where Approval is indicated in italics, this is the expected automatic approval time should the requester not explicitly reject the assignment.
At the assignment level, the interface offers the following actions.
- Reject: reject an assignment.
- Note: the interface requires the requester to provide feedback to the worker, and rejections must be carried out individually. This limitation is intentional and designed to encourage judicious use of the rejection process.
- Approve Selected: approve the visible selected assignments.
- Assignments are selected by checking the checkbox to the leftmost column.
- All visible assignments may be selected at once by using the checkbox in the column header.
- Previously rejected assignments may be approved from the Rejected or All views.
- Bonus: Send a bonus payment to an individual worker.
- Bonus payments can only be sent to workers who have carried out tasks in the last six months and in relation to a specific assignment.
- Bonus payments require a bonus value, in US dollars, and a message explaining the reason for the payment.
- Note that bonus payments are subject to an Amazon fee, similar to the fee charged on the assignment itself.
- A payment reference is available which must be unique for each payment in a 24 hour period. This defaults to the last six characters of the
WorkerId
and the last six characters of theAssignmentId
, separated by a hyphen (-
). In the event that a bonus payment fails, it can be resent with the same reference without the risk of making the payment twice. Should you wish to send a second bonus to the same worker, for the same assignment, in a 24 hour period the reference should be changed.
- Message: see the Worker Actions section below.
- Message Displayed: Send a message to all currently displayed workers.
- This action respects the current filter option. For example, to message only Approved workers, select the Approved filter before choosing this action.
- All: Send a message to all workers for this HIT.
- This action is equivalent to selecting the All filter and choosing the Message Displayed action.
In addition to actions which strictly relate to existing tasks, the interface also offers Worker Actions. These are activated using the Worker Actions button on the Manage HITs overview page.
This action allows the requester to send a message to an individual worker for whom they have previously accepted or rejected an assignment.
Messages can be sent to multiple workers at the same time, the WorkerId
should be space or comma (,
) separated, subject to a limit of 100 workers (See Limitations for more details).
Messages require a subject (of up to 200 characters) and message content (up to 4,096 characters).
Note: The MTurk API does not indicate failure to send a message, and messages to a non-existent or an uncontactable WorkerId
may appear reported as Sent.
This action allows you to create a one-off payment task for a given WorkerId
. One-off Payment tasks allow you to quickly create a make-up or compensation task for a worker where they have completed a previous task for you but have been unable to submit due to a technical error.
The action creates a Mechanical Turk hosted task unique to the worker. When accepted the task verifies the WorkerId
, attempts to automatically submit, and pays the listed reward value automatically after the specified delay. Note that these payments are subject to an Amazon fee, as with any other task.
To prevent unauthorised workers from claiming the reward, unauthorised workers are identified and not permitted to submit the task. Further, the interface creates a unique qualification for the worker, and requires this qualification to find, preview, and accept the task.
While every effort has been made to ensure unauthorised workers will be unable to access and submit the task, no liability is accepted for misdirected payments.
Once you have created a One-off Payment task, the URL is provided and should be sent to the worker, explaining that they must accept and submit the task to receive their payment. Typically this is done by replying to an email from the worker and their initial enquiry.
Note: The Message Worker functionality is typically unsuitable for this reply as the requester is unlikely to have accepted or rejected work. The MTurk API does not notify the requester of failure to send a message, and may incorrectly indicate that the message was Sent. In instances where the requester has rejected work, an approval is usually the requested remedy of the worker and should be preferred.
Once created, you may view the task in the management interface, as with any other task. The assignment is submitted with a number of parameters for auditing purposes as follows:
- parameter-assignmentId
AssignmentId
as specified by MTurk.
- parameter-hitId
HitId
as specified by MTurk.
- parameter-turkSubmitTo
- Submission URL as specified by MTurk.
- parameter-workerId
WorkerId
as specified by MTurk.
- javascript-clientTime
- The reported client time of the worker's browser, in ISO format (UTC).
- javascript-userAgent
- The reported user-agent string of the worker's browser.
- javascript-windowLocation
- The URL of the task, as hosted by MTurk.
- javascript-documentReferrer
- The URL which brought the worker to the task.
- javascript-clientIp
- The IP address of the worker.
- This is gathered by the client, at accept time, using the third-party https://www.ipify.org/ API.
- The IP address of the worker.
These items are displayed in the interface as the Answer for the task and are included in any downloaded data files.
For reference, the following described the process used to create One-off Payment tasks.
- A custom "Worker ID is
WorkerId
"QualificationTypeId
is created. - The
QualificationTypeId
is associated with theWorkerId
. - A
HIT
is created, as follows:
- Type:
HTMLQuestion
- Hosted by MTurk.
- Validates
WorkerId
is as specified. - Provides Submit button and automatically attempts to submit.
- Automatically approves once submitted, after the specified delay.
- Requires the
QualificationTypeId
created.QualificationTypeId
:Exists
ActionsGuarded
:DiscoverPreviewAndAccept
This action provides a quick link to the appropriate requester page at mturk.com to manage additional worker actions including blocking workers and viewing currently assigned qualifications.
- When extending an expired task, the expected expiry time indicated may be slightly inaccurate.
- This appears to be an issue with the API. While the interface specifies the precise expiration time in the API call, Amazon appears not to respect this for currently expired HITs. Extensions to currently active HITs are typically precise and as indicated.
- Tasks created with fewer then 10 assignments may not be extended to have 10 or more assignments.
- This is a limitation of Amazon Mechanical Turk. For more information see the Amazon Mechanical Turk API Reference.
- Amazon formatted CSV export using the same timestamp format as the original Amazon Mechanical Turk exports, however all timestamps are exported as PST. Previously, Amazon would report the timestamp in PST (-8 hours) or PDT (-7 hours) as was appropriate to Seattle, Washington. The exported timestamps are calculated using a negative 8 hour offset from UTC, and are always reported in PST regardless of the current DST offset of Amazon HQ.
- ISO format example: 2018-01-23T08:27:02.000Z
- Amazon format example: Tue Jan 23 12:27:02 PST 2018
This tool has been developed rapidly, and primarily with the needs of the author in mind.
The interface has only undergone limited testing, primarily with ExternalQuestion
type HITs and with the Locale Qualification.
- HITs which do not include an
ExternalURL
or of the typeHTMLQuestion
will not have a (Preview) link. - Only three built in qualifications are identified: Locale, to country level; Masters; and Adult. Other qualifications are indicated as a count only.
By default, dates and times are shown in the interface in the browser reported timezone using toLocaleDateString()
. You may also select GMT (UTC), ISO (UTC) or Amazon formats. When exporting data timestamps are reported using ISO format (UTC) or Amazon equivalent format (PST, as detailed above).
Where existing functionality was retained in the official interface, it may not be replicated here. For example, blocking workers may still be done from the official requester workers page.
To minimise the number of API calls, the interface caches the HIT and Assignment data for 5 minutes. If you wish to manually refresh the results, you may click the in-page refresh icon to the right of the search field and assignment filters.
The tool loads all relevant data on each refresh, and does not paginate the results. When managing several hundred tasks or assignments, there may be a small delay in loading the data from the API. Loading activity is indicated in the top right of the console. The tool has been tested, and is functional, with in excess of 350 active tasks loaded.
A maximum of 100 workers may be messaged at once.
- This is the result of a limitation of Amazon Mechanical Turk. For more information see the Amazon Mechanical Turk API Reference.
- Should you have a HIT that has more than 100 workers whom you wish to message, this can be accomplished by downloading the data and pasting the
WorkerId
s into the Worker IDs box in groups of up to 100. EachWorkerId
should be separated using a space or comma (,
) character.- Pasting into the text box directly from Excel or another spreadsheet application should be sufficient.
The parameters specified in (Preview) links include the additional parameter source=manage-hits-console
to aid in identification of previews generated by this tool.
When set to pay Immediately, the One-off Payment tasks may take a few minutes to actually approve. This is a limitation of MTurk, which appears to use a periodic rather than event driven approach to making these payments.
- Fixed typo in one-off payment task.
- Added
onbeforeunload
exit check. - Updated URL and license for Reload icon.
- Updated copyright dates.
- Updated jQuery to 3.4.1 (was 3.3.1)
- Updated AlaSQL to 0.5.1 (was 0.4.5)
- Updated AWS SDK to 2.585.0 (was 2.224.1)
- Removed default action for One-off Payments and explicitly require JavaScript.
- Added active HIT check to Multi-HIT Delete button (#1).
- Bumped AWS SDK to 2.224.1 (was 2.223.1)
- Added Worker Actions functionality.
- Message Worker: (added button) send a message any previously approved or rejected
WorkerId
. - One-off Payment: create a make-up or compensation task for any
WorkerId
. - Visit mturk.com: link to https://requester.mturk.com for managing worker block status and qualifications.
- Message Worker: (added button) send a message any previously approved or rejected
- Added timezone display option to login screen.
- Default to local timezone, as reported by the browser.
- Note: only affects displayed times, downloaded data is still in ISO or Amazon format.
- Added check to date processing, to catch
undefined
dates. - Added expected automatic approval time in italics.
- Added basic Rate Limit check to high-frequency actions.
- Added Preview for HITs with a
HTMLQuestion
. - Automatically reset view on mode change.
- Bumped AWS SDK to 2.223.1 (was 2.212.1)
- Fixed overview level actions regression caused by introducing tool tips.
- Moved activity indicator to float.
- Fixed minor graphical glitch.
- Added
HitId
,HitTypeId
,HitGroupId
, andAssignmentId
hover-over tool tips. - Minor documentation changes.
- Bumped AWS SDK to 2.212.1 (was 2.211.1)
- Switched to MIT License.
- Removed cc-by-sa 3.0 licensed CSV export code.
- Added external dependency on AlaSQL (0.4.5).
- Improved search functionality.
- Search now matches all terms, but in any order, and allows quoting.
- Added manual refresh functionality.
- Lengthened default refresh to 5 minutes.
- Added SRI hashes to all third-party external resources.
- Bumped AWS SDK to 2.211.1 (was 2.210.0)
- Fixed bug in overview Download functionality where headers may be misaligned in cases where column names differ between visible tasks.
- Added overview level actions: Download, Amazon, and Delete.
- Added account balance to header.
- Added usage note advising against web-deployment.
- Corrected documentation for Add Time functionality.
- Expanded documentation for Bonus and Message functionality.
- Added note about older versions of the
AmazonMechanicalTurkReadOnly
policy not allowing theListHits
operation. - Fixed minor errors in documentation.
- Bumped AWS SDK to 2.210.0 (was 2.188.0)
- Avoid calling the API where empty results sets will occur.
- Only request additional HIT and Assignment results if the API returns the maximum allowed in the previous call.
- Replaced all
alert
andprompt
pop-ups with jQuery UI dialogs to allow for richer user interactions.- Added external dependency on jQuery UI (1.12.1)
- Added
iframe
previews forExternalQuestion
HITs- Added simulated acceptance of tasks.
- Added worker management features
- Bonus: Pay workers bonus
- Message: Send messages to workers
- Bumped AWS SDK to 2.188.0 (was 2.186.0)
- Initial release
- Investigate alternative login solutions.
- Possible pagination of tasks and assignments.
Improve search functionality.- Extend and improve qualifications information.
- Possible task creation support.
Create one-off payment tasks.
Add worker contact and additional management options.- Possibly add Block functionality.
Provideiframe
previews of tasks.- Allow direct access to a given
HITId
.
This tool is based on, includes, links to, or extends a number of additional resources. These are acknowledged here.
-
Amazon AWS SDK
- Amazon.com, Inc.
- https://github.com/aws/aws-sdk-js
- License: Apache License 2.0
-
jQuery
- JS Foundation
- https://jquery.com
- License: MIT License
-
jQuery UI
- JS Foundation
- https://jqueryui.com
- License: MIT License
-
AlaSQL
- Andrey Gershun
-
Ajax-loader.gif (optimised, base64 encoded, embedded)
- ajaxload.info (http://www.ajaxload.info)
- https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ajax-loader.gif
- License: Public Domain
-
Reload (embedded)
-
ipify: https://www.ipify.org/
-
Enable JavaScript: https://enable-javascript.com
Copyright © 2018-2019 Jason T. Jacques
- Email: jtjacques@gmail.com
- Web: jsonj.co.uk
mturk-manage.html is released under the terms of the MIT License.
Ajax-loader.gif is public domain, as acknowledged above, and is included under such provision.
Reload icon is released under the CC0 Public Domain Dedication, as acknowledged above, and is included under such provision.
Externally loaded resources (AWS SDK, jQuery, jQuery UI, AlaSQL) are subject to their own licenses.