Habit 2.1.25 released
A new version of Habit, version 2.1.25, is available for download! You may install this version (if you choose) over your existing version - your experimental settings and results will be saved.
What's changed?
Well, a lot, actually, but not much that you will see....yet. I've begun making some major changes under the hood, preparing for a major new release this summer (along with a long-awaited methods paper describing Habit2 and its many uses).
There are several changes which you will see, along with some minor bug fixes that will clean up some problems that users have reported (THANK YOU to all of you who have taken the time to report errors and problems!).
You say "tomato"...
Several users reported situations where they created experiments with valid stimuli, but found that the stimuli names were yellowed out in the "Stimuli" panel, or sometimes the "Stimuli Orders" panel of the Experiment Editor. The yellow color indicated a problem, but there was no clear reason (this occurred even when the stimuli were all valid files present on the computer).
The bug (fixed in this version) was due to Habit2 using different "rules" for the names that can be given to stimuli. What was allowed as a name when the stimulus was added to the experiment was NOT allowed in other contexts within Habit. This inconsistency has been corrected.
For the record, stimulus names (the names you give them, not their filenames) must adhere to the following rules. The dialog will enforce these rules as you type - so there isn't really a need to remember them. The rules are that a stimulus name:
Results Viewer changes
The Results Viewer has been changed somewhat. Previously you could use the Results Viewer to view results and examine experiment settings in use when a particular result was obtained.
I've cleaned up the display a bit, and you will notice that two types of files are displayed: *.hab file (the results file written on completion of an experimental run), and *.csv file (exported results data for use in you analysis).
What's changed?
Well, a lot, actually, but not much that you will see....yet. I've begun making some major changes under the hood, preparing for a major new release this summer (along with a long-awaited methods paper describing Habit2 and its many uses).
There are several changes which you will see, along with some minor bug fixes that will clean up some problems that users have reported (THANK YOU to all of you who have taken the time to report errors and problems!).
You say "tomato"...
Several users reported situations where they created experiments with valid stimuli, but found that the stimuli names were yellowed out in the "Stimuli" panel, or sometimes the "Stimuli Orders" panel of the Experiment Editor. The yellow color indicated a problem, but there was no clear reason (this occurred even when the stimuli were all valid files present on the computer).
The bug (fixed in this version) was due to Habit2 using different "rules" for the names that can be given to stimuli. What was allowed as a name when the stimulus was added to the experiment was NOT allowed in other contexts within Habit. This inconsistency has been corrected.
For the record, stimulus names (the names you give them, not their filenames) must adhere to the following rules. The dialog will enforce these rules as you type - so there isn't really a need to remember them. The rules are that a stimulus name:
- must begin with a letter or number
- contains letters, numbers, and/or these characters: space, _ (underscore), - (dash), ' (single quote)
- trailing space(s) are trimmed before saving in the database
Results Viewer changes
The Results Viewer has been changed somewhat. Previously you could use the Results Viewer to view results and examine experiment settings in use when a particular result was obtained.
I've cleaned up the display a bit, and you will notice that two types of files are displayed: *.hab file (the results file written on completion of an experimental run), and *.csv file (exported results data for use in you analysis).
Double-clicking on a csv file will open that file in Excel (assuming you have Excel installed on your computer). Double-clicking on a results (*.hab) file will open that file and present you with 4 options (there used to be just 3):
- The results widget displays a brief summary of the experimental run. Hitting the "Print" button will print that summary.
- The "Export Event Log" button will generate a csv file containing all events recorded during the experiment. DO NOT ATTEMPT TO USE THIS FILE DIRECTLY FOR YOUR ANALYSIS! The file contains more information than is recorded in the regular csv results, but it is not intended for regular use. The meanings of the various entries in the file may not be clear from their names, and you may obtain results that are not accurate! Only use the regular csv results output!
- The "View Experiment Settings" button will display (in read-only form) the experiment settings that were in use when the experiment was run.
- New! The "Export CSV" button will re-generate the results csv file for this experiment. This can be useful when you have older results, but want to get the csv file with up-to-date format. Changes in the way Habit summarizes and displays the results can lead to results files with inconsistent formats. This button causes Habit to attempt a re-analysis of the event log and re-generates the csv file with the latest-and-greatest format and contents (see notes for the 2.1.19 release).