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New features in ERTS since Version 3.18

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1. for both commands Syntax SETECHO Position PosNo Font Case Prompt Position see manual PosNo Index of position within the position definition Default 1 If 0 i th keystroke will be displayed on i th position index Case Determines case of echo 0 Lower case 1 Upper Case default 2 Mixed Case Prompt Determines the display of empty echo field as underlined input field 0 Do not display empty echo field 1 Display empty echo field with underscore characters default 11 1 3 New SW trial command Single Word presentation The new SW trial command provides the functionality of presenting text pictures in a word wise mode The SW command calls a user defined trial definition for each blank separated token of the text picture Thus events for each single word presentation can defined in a very flexible way by just creating the appropriate trial definition Syntax SW TextPic MaxWords SWmode SWMask SWTrial VarArgList TextPic Name of text picture that should be presented in single word mode Trial commands within SWTrial which display TextPic automatically refer to the single word MaxWords Maximum number of words in one text picture Can be set to 0 if trial does not contain response registration SWmode Determines the location of the single words 1 Words are displayed superimposed on the same location 2 Words on original location within sentence If words are presented in OR mode entire sentence will be build word wise 3 Inc
2. tolerance Largest time period between two successive measurements which are tolerated default lms Must be set to screen refresh rate if SyncFlag is active Nerrors Number of out of range errors until TESTTIME aborts execution SyncFlag Synchronize each measurement with vertical retrace of the screen TESTTIME continuously reads the millisecond timer and checks the time period between two measurements If this period is beyond or below the tolerance range the error count is incremented After Nerrors the test run will be aborted An interval between two measurements is typically several microseconds Some small variability due to memory refresh and hardware interrupts is normal and should not exceed one millisecond Set the SyncFlag to test screen sync and accuracy in combination with a slower measurement rate If timing is correct TESTTIME should run several minutes without aborting Recommended length for one test run is between 30 and 60 seconds If any distortions exist they usually show up immediately after several Page 44 New Features from October 5 2003 seconds TESTTIME aborts and displays the last 100 measurements the internal timer tic values and a frequency distribution of the measurements Note that the scale of the frequency table is dynamically extended which implies the loss of previous samples 11 5 New utility MERGEVOC for dichotic tasks MERGEVOC is a utility for generating sound samples for dichotic tasks prior to the
3. A new trial command is supported for playing the video s loaded with SP or FP commands 4 1 1 New PICTURE type V To define a Video use the PICTURE command with the new picture type V Specify the full path and filename to load a FLIC FLI or FLC files there are several new subtypes that may be used to specify certain variants of videos FLIC files are played directly from disk The first frame is internally preloaded into the invisible screen buffer and displayed with one screen refresh All subsequent frames are rendered into the visible screen buffer Video pacing can be done by either millisecond times or by multiples of screen refreshes For the later the nearest multiple of screen refreshs are used to reflect the frame rate as defined in the FLIC file Syntax PICTURE name V subtype file subtype r Repeat Video Note that the file must include a ring frame that defines the transition between last frame and second frame This is the default for FLIC s Single frame Only ony single frame is displayed and the video will not run m Load file into conventional memory and play from memory Note that this is only recommended for small videos see also subtype C c Copy video definition and share memory If you use this subtype specify a name of a picture instead of a file name ERTS does copy the picture definitions and shares the video data without allocating new memory Use this subtyte to create copies of the same video if y
4. Shut down from in the Start menu of Win95 and select restart in prompt mode pressing SHIFT key while clicking on OK speeds restart up Creating a short cut for MS DOS in real mode 3 Create a second short cut in the start menu by copying the default MS DOS short cut in the start menu and rename this to e g Real MS DOS Then edit the advanced program options and set execution mode to MS DOS 10 3 TESTVKEY V1 03 for testing voice key thresholds For easier adjustment of the voice key threshold and the SoundBlaster input mixer settings the new TESTVKEY utility has been designed TESTVKEY visualizes the current input volume and may be called with different threshold values for optimizing voice key sensitivity Usage TESTVKEY MaxVol MaxCross MinVol MaxVol Volume threshold 0 127 default 25 A null turns off volume based threshold MaxCross Frequency threshold 0 65535 default 25 A null turns off frequency based threshold A value of 30 50 is a reasonable value see TESTVKEY utility MinVol Minimum volume threshold for counting zero crossings 0 127 default 2 The frequency threshold is based on a zero crossing algorithm which counts pos neg amplitude peeks larger than MinVol The number of zero crossings is also displayed Cross The frequency threshold is very sensitive to high pitch noise even at low volume levels e g spoken word five Use volume threshold and frequency threshold together to optimize voice key perform
5. The new arguments are helpful when working with 256 color pictures because those pictures overwrite the entire ERTS color palette with their color palette In order to match the ERTS background with the background of the pictures you must set the same background index and color in ERTS as it is used in the pictures By default ERTS uses palette index 0 for the background color when 256 color are displayed To match the background color not the index you may either define a corresponding color definition or name a BMP RLE graphics file in the optional PicPalette argument In this case ERTS reads the background color out of the picture color palette 10 1 12 User defined index for transparent color When displaying color graphics pictures defined as transparent type Gt ERTS normally loads the first color entry of the color palette index 0 as transparent If the background color of pictures is located on another offset within the color palette you may now add a new optional palette index to the picture definition PICTURE name Gt index datei Index Palette index of transparent color 0 255 default 0 10 2 ERTS and MS Windows 95 Win95 provides much better support for activating DOS applications from within Windows than Win 3 x You can start DOS applications in a DOS box protected mode or in real mode MS DOS which causes a complete unloading of Win95 and re loading after finishing the DOS application It also supports a boot menu
6. Export command line option The command line option E re directing SHOW output to a file has been extended to support RTF file format and the appending of new output to existing files Syntax E WriteMode rtf The WriteMode is one of the symbols Normal Overwrite existing files First Overwrite existing files do not close rtf file Continued Append to existing file do not close rtf file End Append to existing file close rtf file e amp e New Features from October 5 2003 Page 17 Adding the string rtf will enable RTF output format For example E rtf will activate RTF format For non rtf format only WriteModes and make sense 6 New to ERTS V3 27 6 1 General ERTS commands 6 1 1 Simultaneous use of input devices ERTS internal architecture of collecting responses has been changed to support the collection of responses from different input devices at the same time Consequently KEY definitions may now consist of key names that are a mixture of different input sources 6 1 2 UK Update Key Definition trial command If the correct response sequence depends on a randomly generated order this command may be used to derive the updated order of keys from a set of key definitions UK KeySet KeySequ NKeys Reverse KeySet Set consisting of key definitions that will be written into KeySequ KeySequ Key definition that will be updated according KeySet NKeys N
7. If zero all positions of TargPos are valid Defines the size of the valid area around each target zone KEY definition that is used as mapping table for leaving the start zone and target zones First key is used for leaving the target zone The remaining keys are mapped to the target locations in ascending order Maximum response time like RK SET Definition that contains at least two pictures The first picture is used outside of valid zones the second on target zones Valid picture types are P G R Determines metric of radius 0 Screen position 1 Angle of joystick position see STICKANGLE Wait for Joystick Position This command waits until the joystick is positioned on a target position for a given amount of time Note that this event is not recorded Syntax WJ TargPos PosNo PosRadius OnTarget Cursor Scale TargPos PosNo PosRadius OnTarget Cursor Scale POSITION definition that defines the target position Index of position within TargPos that is used as target position Radius around TargPos that defines the size of the target area Time in milliseconds which defined the duration at which the cursor must be on target before the response is accepted Set definition that contains at least two pictures The first picture is used outside of valid zones the second on target zones Valid picture types are P G R Determines metric of radius 0 Screen position 1 Angle of joystick position see STICKANGLE New Features f
8. Load Sound trial command The new LS trial command pre loads sound samples into Extended Memory that are defined in ERTS as a dynamically loadable Tone Syntax LS ToneName ToneName Name of a tone definition of type S Use this new command to control the time when dynamic sound samples are pre loaded By default ERTS preloads tones immediately before presenting them If the time interval is too short the LS commands can be used to load samples at the beginning of the trial 3 1 2 Displaying time of block Additional place holders in formatted pictures support the display of the elapsed or residual block execution time t Elapsed block execution time in seconds T Residual block execution time in seconds MAXTIME must be active The new LS trial command pre loads sound samples into Extended Memory that are defined in ERTS as a dynamically loadable Tone Syntax LS ToneName ToneName Name of a tone definition of type S Use this new command to control the time when dynamic sound samples are pre loaded By default ERTS preloads tones immediately before presenting them If the time interval is too short the LS commands can be used to load samples at the beginning of the trial New Features from October 5 2003 Page 11 4 New to ERTS V3 30 4 1 Video support With ERTS Version 3 30 the FLIC video format is supported with minor exceptions Videos are defined as PICTURES and loaded just as pictures on screen locations
9. New optional session comment A new Type of the PROMPT system command has been created to support input of an optional session comment which if defined is added to the result table header type Determines type of input data case sensitive C Text input which is used as comment see manual for other types 11 2 ERTSCODE 11 2 1 New pre defined text constant The new HEADCOMMENT text constant holds the content of the new optional ERTS comment line if present in the result table header 11 3 New utility TESTVKEY for testing voice key For easier adjustment of the voice key threshold and the SoundBlaster input mixer settings the new TESTVKEY utility has been designed TESTVKEY visualizes the current input volume and may be called with different threshold values for optimizing voice key sensitivity Usage TESTVKEY threshold threshold value between 1 and 127 Use TESTVKEY in combination with the SoundBlaster utility SBI6SET to try different combinations of input gain automatic gain control AGC and voice key threshold 11 4 New utility TESTTIME for testing millicesond timer The new TESTTIME utility has been designed for testing accuracy and reliability of the ERTS millisecond timer in different operating systems and hardware configurations The main purpose is to detect distortions caused by multitasking operating systems time consuming background processes or defective timer chips Usage TESTTIME tolerance Nerrors SyncFlag
10. ParSet ForceEndOfTracking ListMode AutoStart AutoStart 0 Task is started by key press default 1 Task is started automatically New Features from October 5 2003 Page 5 1 16 Periodic syncing with external counter The WC trial command Wait for external Counter has been extended to support a periodic syncing on every i th trial Syntax WC NTics ResetCounter Cycle Cycle Integer value that defines the number of repetitions in which the WC command should be executed For example a value of 2 means that every second time the WC command will wait for an external counter value Use this new argument if you want to run several trials in between two external MRI signals but still want to re calibrate with each new signal 1 17 Writing all results at end of session By default ERTS is storing results after each block If your block transitions are time critical use the new J command line option to hold all results in memory until the end of the session This will of course require more working memory than the block wise writing of results This new option does not work in combination with tracking tasks and staircases 1 18 Analog joystick response in ERTS ERTS provides some support for analog joystick responses that are based on movement The registration of the analog joystick must follow different principles because the game port does not produce interrupts ERTS must poll the game port in order to detect
11. This argument lists character which will be used with this font No other character bitmaps are loaded except the blank character dec 32 The list of used characters must not include a blank 10 1 10 Modified FB command The meaning of Sequential argument new name CompMode has been slightly changed If you have used an argument setting larger than 1 to reduce the comparison of keys to one particular input you must rewrite the script by using the new argument KeyIndex of the FB command FB CorrKey CorrNo CompMode RtMin RtMax RtMode KeyIndex CompMode Determines how keys are compared in multiple key input situations 0 Correct is if one of the reponses matches one of the correct keys 1 Correct is if the order of input corresponds to order of correct keys 2 Correct if all correct keys appear in key input independent of order KeyIndex Determines which latency will be compared in multiple key input situations 0 Compare all input i gt 0 Compare only i th input New Features from October 5 2003 Page 35 10 1 11 User defined index for background color The SCREENCOLOR system command has been extended to support a user defined index for the ERTS background color SCREENCOLOR Fore Back Index PicPalette Fore Foreground color Back Background color Index Palette index 0 255 for ERTS background PicPalette Name of BMP or RLE graphics file from where ERTS should extract the background color according to Index
12. This is similar to parallel drawing of elements but instead the parallel element will just be removed Page 4 New Features from October 5 2003 1 13 Start message and warning tone for unstable tracking The RUNUNSTABLE command has been extended to support the display of a start message at the beginning of the tracking task and the presentation of a warning tone prior to hitting the borders Syntax RUNUNSTABLE T WarmUp T Record Lambda Gain Range Key Compress Tone StartPic StartPos StartFont WarnRange StartPic The name of the picture definition that should be displayed as the starting message at the beginning of the tracking task StartPos The name of the position definition on which the start message should be displayed StartFont The name of a font definition that should be used to render the message WarnRange The quiet tracking range mm 10 If this range is exceeded by the vertical bar a warning tone will be presented as defined in the Tone argument 1 14 Selective feedback for dual task situations The OK command has been extended to support selected evaluations of responses with respect to time and key order Syntax OK CompMode KeyIndex LowTime HighTime LowKey HighKey Low High Time Limits the evaluation to responses that are greater than LowTime and lower than HighTime All other responses will be ignored Low High Key Limits the evaluation of responses to key presses that are inbetween LowKey
13. any changes Because of this the time resolution depends on CPU speed and the response characteristic of the game port You can test this speed by checking the port with the TESTJOY utility In average response time should be within a 5ms range Unlike with the RK command there exist some same restrictions for MM and MJ Only the next trial command is executed and then ERTS waits for a joystick response There is no continuation and no internal pre loading of images before the response is made or MaxRT is expired There are two ways to think about joystick movements One is in terms of the angle the joystick is moved away from the center position The second is in terms of screen coordinates where the joystick cursor is located For recording joystick movements as a response the following trial commands have been implemented MM Record the leaving of a center position and crossing of circular boundaries MJ Record the leaving of a starting zone and arrival on target zone Please note that all features described in this chapter are provided on an as is base 1 19 MM Measure Movement The MM command measures the time until the joystick is moved across user defined boundaries Key names are assigned to each boundaries in order to code the event in the result file Syntax MM Radius Angle Tolerance Keys MaxRt Cursor ResultMode Scale Page 6 Radius Angle Tolerance Keys MaxRt Cursor ResultFormat Scale New Fea
14. certain number of scan periods Syntax MAXCOUNT MaxBlk MaxTrl MaxBlk Number of tics after which a running block should be aborted default is 0 MaxTrl Number of tics after which a running trial should be aborted default is 0 5 2 3 WC trial command The WC trial command Wait Count waits for a certain number of external tics Use this command to synchronize trial events with external events Syntax WC Ntics Reset Ntics Number of tics to wait default is 0 Reset Reset counter after waiting 0 Do not reset 1 Reset to Null default By using the Reset argument you can decide whether you want to use the external counter in absolute mode or in lap mode Note that resetting this counter does not influence the MaxBlk and MaxTrl abort conditions set by MAXCOUNT or MC 5 2 4 MC trial command The MC trial command Max Count limits the execution time of a trial to a certain number of tics This is equivalent to the second argument of the MAXCOUNT session command except that this command is used on the trial level and thus enables you to define different values for trials within one block Syntax MC MaxTics MaxTics Number of tics after which this trial should be aborted default is 0 This command counts always from the beginning of a trial independent where you place this command within the trial definition However the command will not be active before it is executed Therefore you should position it early enough with
15. for booting real mode DOS directly ERTS will only be accurate in real mode MS DOS but will also run in protected mode MS DOS within a full screen DOS box In the later case timing and screen sync will be accurate enough for testing experiment definitions 10 2 1 Activating ERTS from within Win95 Create a short cut and edit properties actually editing PIF files Set Full screen mode deactivate any Win95 key assignments set IDL time to low Real mode DOS accurate If you want to start ERTS in real mode DOS accurate set advanced program options to MS DOS In this case you even have the opportunity to define special CONFIG SYS and AUTOXEC BAT files e g loading DOS SoundBlaster drivers Page 36 New Features from October 5 2003 Protected mode DOS not accurate but comfortable If you want to start ERTS protected mode DOS not accurate but fast turn around then set the advanced program options to Mode suggested by Win95 default 10 2 2 Activating ERTS from the DOS prompt Selecting prompt mode from the boot menu 1 edit the file msdos sys in your boot directory by first removing the shr flags with ATTRIB and then editing the file with EDIT Insert BootMenu 1 into the option section This will activate the Win95 boot menu each time you start the computer You can select normal mode or prompt mode at this point same as pressing F8 during boot phase Restarting the computer in prompt mode 2 Select
16. the ERTS system directory or the current directory To activate other keyboard layouts either overwrite this standard file or add the name of another key definition file to the command line when calling ERTS This file must have the file extension KEY in order to be recognized by ERTS as a key definition file Look in your ERTS system directory for prototypes of keyboard files for different countries Their name is KEY nnn where nnn is the country Each line in the key definition file assigns one key name to an internal keyboard scan code ScanCode KeyName See the standard keyboard file for the meaning of the scancodes For overwriting key names you may create partial definition files which only assign new names to task relevant scancodes You must not define duplicate names The following keyboard file assigns dummy names to the digit keys 1 4 to make the names available and then assigns the digit names to the keyboard keys A X M L Now you could use these keys as response keys which produce the symbols 1 2 3 4 as screen echo AON o wo Page 16 New Features from October 5 2003 oa O AON 5 5 SHOWTTL utility With the SHOWTTL utility you may debug and verify the correct sending of ERTS sync signals For this you must connect your ERTS computers via parallel cable e g LapLink cable with another PC While running an ERTS script which includes sync signals you may run SHOWTTL on the other receiving computer and watch the timi
17. will be registered as pressed This trial command helps you to automatize computation of time differences between a subject s response and a stimulus onset Whenever you have the response registration turned on before a stimulus onset occures this trial command will help you to determine the exact time difference between stimulus onset and response For example if you ask a subject to synchronize the key press with the onset of a second stimulus estimate time interval you want to record responses before and after the second stimulus in order to get early and late responses If you generate an artificial response together with the second stimulus you can calculate the lap between onset and response by subtracting the latency of the real reaction from the artificial reaction 7 1 4 CJ Conditional jump trial command This new trial command can be used to branch to another trial specification within a block definition or to a session label within the session definition dependent on feedback classifications TrialIDs or session labels are used as destination labels CJ Labell Label2 Label3 Labell2 Label Destination label that should be branched to on the occasion of feedback class Use the TrialID to branch to a certain trial within the block definition use N or N to make a relative jump N th trials forward or backward use a session label to end a block and to jump to a session label or use the reserved name STOP to finish a b
18. 00 800 500 900 PICTURE Instruct T Press SHL or SHR to test key coding Press SPACE to Exit POSITION Center P 0 0 TRIAL Test SP Instruct Center WK Space SESSION KEYCODE CodeKeys CodeTones CodeSequ 1 O RUNTRIAL Test 11 1 8 New WP trial command Wait for parallel port The new WP trial command allows synchronization of trial events with external trigger signals which are read from the status lines of one of the parallel ports Note that these trigger signals cannot be used for response registration but only for synchronization Use the EXKEY logic for registering external TTL sig nals as responses Syntax WP BitPattern Channel Cancel BitPattern Name of a sequence definition which contains exactly one masked byte Channel Channel number 1 4 translated by ERTSCFG to parallel port numbers Default 1 Cancel Cancel mode see other trial commands for description Default 0 The WP command waits until the state of the status lines matches the specified bits Masked bits are ignored You may use up to five different status lines Line Bit Value Pin at Connector BUSY 4 16 11 ACK 3 8 10 PE 2 4 12 Select 1 2 13 Error 0 1 15 The following example illustrates how to use the WP command to wait for a signal at the BUSY line New Features from October 5 2003 Page 41 I SEQUENCE IsBusy B nnntnnnn SEQUENCE IsReady B nnnOnnnn PICTURE WaitForBusy N PICTURE WaitForReady N POSITION Center P 0 0 TRIAL TestWP SP WaitForBu
19. 1111100000 0000011110 BLOCK OddEven 10 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 ShowDig 1 ShowDig 2 ShowDig 3 ShowDig 4 ShowDig 5 ShowDig 6 ShowDig 7 ShowDig 8 ShowDig 9 ShowDig 10 PARAMETER TMode S OONODOBWNH SESSION Example for constrained random sequences TRANSMAT 3 TTM1 RUNBLOCK OddEven 100 The next example defines two matrices to define the following transition rule The same trial specification is not repeated within the next 4 trials SET NoRep 0 EEEE ee E E E ee E EE a E E E E E a E E E o r A T o E r Sy ee E E PE T e e T aaa EEE o E E E No ne E E O a aaa TRANSMAT 3 NoRep NoRep NoRep NoRep Page 10 New Features from October 5 2003 3 New to ERTS V3 31 3 1 Direct SoundBlaster Output To support a larger variety of Laptops and the new SoundBlaster PCI cards a direct SoundBlaster output has been implemented that does not require pre installed Creative Labs DOS drivers for presenting sound samples VOC WAV This new feature solves the following problems e Missing or bad installation of Creative Labs DOS drivers e Drivers related problems on SB compatible cards e Problems with compatible cards that require enabling routine under DOS In those cases loading of DOS drivers in config sys was impossible This relates to Laptops and new PCI cards The new direct SB support is limited to the following sound formats e 8 Bit mono and 16 bit mono stereo WAV output no VOC and no 8 bit stereo 3 1 1 LS
20. History of new features of ERTS Last updated 5 Oct 03 1 New to ERTS V3 36 1 1 Multiple Session definitions You can now define different session structures for the same experiment by creating multiple session definitions within the same ERTS script Syntax SESSION Name Name Name of Session which is used also as short description within the results file In order to be compatible to previous ERTS releases the name is optional but must be defined if multiple sessions are defined Only the token up to the next delimiter blank comma will be used as the name If multiple sessions are defined you must either assign session definitions to subject groups see new GROUP command or ERTS will randomly select one of the session definitions when you launch an experimental session The name of the selected session is displayed before starting the experimental session and the session number is included in the result file 1 2 Subject groups In order to automate between subject designs the new GROUP command supports the definition of subject groups Syntax GROUP Name SessName SubjNol SubjNo2 SubjNoN Name Name of the group This will be listed in the result file SessName Name of the session definition which should be launched fort his group SubjNo Subject numbers that belong to this group A group is defined by simply enumerating the subject numbers that go into this group The group is then assigned to a session definitio
21. SP Becker KeyPos 1 amp SP Graf KeyPos 2 amp SP Jackson KeyPos 3 amp SP Houston KeyPos 4 amp SP KeyUp KeyPos 1 O O Blue amp SP KeyUp KeyPos 2 O O Blue amp SP KeyUp KeyPos 3 O O Blue amp SP KeyUp KeyPos 4 O O Blue amp SP Center 1 0 1 FB OK 1 SP KeyDown KeyPos 1 500 O Blue 2 SP KeyDown KeyPos 2 500 O Blue 3 SP KeyDown KeyPos 3 500 O Blue 4 SP KeyDown KeyPos 4 500 O Blue New Features from October 5 2003 Page 29 I BLOCK Test 4 1 ShowName Boris 1 1 ShowName Steffi 2 1 ShowName Michael 3 1 ShowName Whitney 4 SESSION Test new TP command Transform Positions TRANSPOS KeyPos KeyTbl 400 200 Cursor StartPos RUNBLOCK Test 9 1 4 Extended image to image transfer capabilities The TI Transfer Image trial command has been extended to support transfer in both directions between current image and additional images and to support masked transfer of images for easy masking or degrading of color stimuli Syntax TI DestImage SrcImage Masked DestImage Index of destination image 0 means default IPL page SrcImage Index of source image whose content should be transfer to the destination image 0 means default IPL page Masked Flag that determines the transfer mode 0 Normal transfer default 1 Masked transfer The source image is only transferred to non background areas of the destination image then load pictures into the default IPL page to define the transparent areas for the image transfer process and then transfer
22. Up Number of consecutive repetitions until the UpDown process reacts Default is 1 AverageTurns Use turns only to estimate average value Note that this parameter is only relevant if you use the SETSCASE or FIXSCASE session commands AutoReset Enables auto resetting of staircase 0 Do not reset staircase 1 Reset staircase after each block 2 Reset staircase after each trial IndexFile Optional path to a an index file that contains an array of values The staircase s value will be used as an index into this array This way you may translate constant step sizes by another functions e g psychometric function Format of index file is number of values in first line followed by all values one per line 7 2 2 INITSCASE session command This command initializes a staircase with starting values You must use this command first before using USESCASE INITSCASE Name StrtVal MinVal MaxVal StepDown StepUp UseRetrace Name Name of staircase StartVal Start value of staircase gt 0 _ Value to be used on first iteration If UseRetrace is active this inital time value will be rounded to the best matching retrace time MinVal or MaxVal will be used at random as start value lt 1 Random start value between MinVal and MaxVal Min MaxVal Minimum Maximum Value that may be reached during UpDown process StepDown Up Step size to go down Up If UseRetrace is active this is the number of retraces to decrease increase value UseRetrace If 1 then StepsUp and S
23. accurate measurements SHOWTTL port T W byte Port Number of parallel port LPT 1 2 3 4 T Show time markers only Use T if screen updating of SHOWTTL takes longer than intervals between signals W Write byte value Dec to parallel port Use this option to write send a byte to a parallel port e g to test the connections between the two computers or to reset a port New Features from October 5 2003 Page 25 8 3 ERTSCODE 8 3 1 NUMERIC keyword for declaring numeric variables The implicit declaration of numeric variables has been removed from ERTSCODE to provide better checking of ERSTCODE jobs You must now declare each numeric variable at the top of a definition file by using the new NUMERIC keyword Syntax NUMERIC VarName VarName Any user defined name for this variable 8 3 2 IMPLICIT keyword The old style implicit declaration of numeric variables can be enabled by inserting the new IMPLICIT at the top of a definition file Syntax IMPLICIT Note that allowing implicit declaration has the potential danger of not recognizing mispelled variable names or non existing columns in the result file because ERTSCODE interprets them implicitly as new variables 8 3 3 New Start_ and Final compute blocks The concept of executing BEGIN and END compute blocks has been extended by START and FINAL_ to improve handling of mutliple input files START_ is executed in the first data row of the first file before BEGIN and normal blo
24. ance MaxVol should be set to a value close to random noise level but sufficiently high to avoid false alarms MaxCross should be set to a value close to random zero crossings but sufficiently high to avoid false alarms Note that number of zero crossings depend also on MinVol MinVol should be set to about the random volume level or even lower to make the frequency based threshold as sensitive as possible If MinVol is too high no zero crossings will be observed at low volume Try different thresholds and mixer settings to find the best configuration for a sensitive voice key without false alarms Configure ERTS with the best threshold values using the ERTSCFG utility Be sure to set mixer settings prior to ERTS sessions New Features from October 5 2003 Page 37 11 ERTS V3 18 11 1 General ERTS commands 11 1 1 New result header format The header of ERTS result files has been slightly changed It now contains an info line about the monitor characteristics like resolution size and refresh rate The version line has been removed moving all fol lowing entries one line upwards Overall number of header lines remained identical except when random seed value is logged 11 1 2 SE trial command SET ECHO Description of the PosNo and Case argument of the SE trial command in the Reference manual is not com plete See SETECHO session command for a complete description of argument PosNo and Case There is also a new argument Prompt
25. and Enhanced CC trial command Syntax CC ChangeMode Hue Saturation Value Level DestColor The valid range of values for the level command has been extended Level 0 Background n gt 1 n th loaded foreground color max 3 for standard ERTS n gt 99 n th 100 color palette entry ERTSVIPL only Whereas level 1 to n lt 99 is intended to address foreground colors loaded internally with the color argument of visual trial commands levels 100 to 355 are intended to address the color palette entries 0 255 explicitly 11 1 6 Revised voice key implementation The implementation of the SoundBlaster voice key has been slightly revised because some user s reported problems activating the voice key To make the voice key more stable the size of the internal transfer buffer has been increased and the threshold must be crossed by at least two values to avoid false alarms by single faulty byte values which have been observed with some mixer settings Resolution and accuracy of voice key registration is lms The resolution for triggering trial event timing and for key coding is however only 200ms Thus if you are waiting for a voice key response within a trial sequence the following event might be late by as much as 200 ms after threshold was actually crossed This is due to the internal buffering of incoming sound data 11 1 7 New KEYCODE session command The new KEYCODE session command may be used to assign parallel port bit patterns and o
26. and HighKey All other responses will be ignored When cutting the evaluation range by defining a LowKey ERTS interpret all following latency relative to LowKey This feature allows you to look at latencies relative to another keystroke If both a key and a time range is defined ERTS will first determine the key range and then will determine the time range relative to LowKey Typically LowKey will refer to a key that is generated by the GR trial command to time stamp the onset of a stimulus within the response interval This way the OK command will only interpret responses that are registered after the onset of that stimulus and will interpret latencies relative to the onset Unlike FB you can use OK multiple times with different parameters This enables you to evaluate all four error conditions one after the other With OK you could even display all messages at once if you use different screen positions 1 15 Immediate start of dual task The RUNMSEARCH and SETMSEARCH command has been extended by the AutoStart argument to support the immediate start of the task without displaying a target set and without waiting for further confirmation by the subject This is useful if the task must be synchronized with EEG MRI devices and when this command is used to display plain lists instead of a memory task see ListMode argument Syntax RUN SETMSEARCH N Valid N WarmUp TargSet ProbeSet TargPos ProbePos StartKey YesNoKey MaxRt Pause Sequence Port
27. atures from October 5 2003 7 3 ERTS Font Converter A new ERTS Font converter is included in the sub directory EFOCONV on the Sample Disk This font converter is a Windows application that lets you convert and export any TrueType Font into a font resource file that can be used from within ERTS The font converter requires windows and can be install by executing SETUP EXE in the sub directory EFOCONV on the sample disk from within windows This font converter is shipped on an as is base Note that any existing copyrights concerning windows fonts must not be violated by the end user Note that for each font size and type you must create a single font resource file To save disk and memory space you may select a sub set of characters to be included in the font resource file Before generating a font you must also set the characteristics of your destinated graphics mode monitor in order to get a properly sized raster font within ERTS To use the new font resource files within ERTS you must append the extension EFO when loading the font with the FONT command 8 New to ERTS V3 25 8 1 General ERTS commands 8 1 1 Sine distributed positions The position definitions of type line and vector have been extended to support sine distributed positions for moving pictures back and forth at sine wave speed POSITION name L xs ys xe ye Npos Sine or POSITION name V x y Length NPos Angle Sine Sine Determines spreading o
28. ax VA PicName Speed StrtFrame CritFrame Key Tone SequOn SequOff Port PicName Name of a Picture definition of type video Speed Sets new video speed A 0 means use speed as defined in file StrtFrame Sets new startframe for video A 0 means start with 1 frame CritFrame Defines a certain frame as the critical frame Specific events can be triggered with this critical frame see next arguments Key Generate internal response using this key if critical frame is displayed Use this option similar to the GR trial command to generate an internal response as a time stamp Note that you must have activated response registration for at least 2 responses Tone Play this tone if the critical frame is displayed Do not use tone definitions that require long loading times SequOn Send this sequence to the parallel port if the critical frame is displayed SequOff Send this sequence to the parallel port if the frame after the critical frame is displayed Port Use this port for SequOn and SequOff 4 1 4 Testing videos with option Tp The Tp command line option Test Picture does support testing of videos By default the first frame is displayed includign the time required to render this frame If you press the P key the video will be played The max time required to render a frame is displayed 4 1 5 Examples Playing a single Video PICTURE myVideo V video flic POSITION Center P 0 0 TRIAL Play SP myVideo Center WK PV Playing a loo
29. been extended Syntax Hn or H w x h n Number of video mode 1 320 x 200 2 640 x 400 3 640 x 480 4 800 x 600 5 1024 x 768 6 1280 x 1024 w Width in pixel of desired resolution h Height in pixel of desired resolution Note that if one dimension is unambiguous then it is sufficient to describe only this value You must however include in any case the x to tell ERTS that this is a resolution and not a video mode New Features from October 5 2003 Page 33 10 1 7 New support of sine wave tones in units of Hertz A new type of tone definition supports the presentation of sine wave tones in units of Hertz via SoundBlaster compatible soundcards OPL chip required There are three independent sources of sine waves Mono Stereo Left and Stereo Right For varying source volume and frequency independently of each other there are three subtypes of Hertz tone definitions Syntax TONE name H subtype subtype t Tone definition default v Volume definition s Source definition The volume and source subtypes only set the characteristics for subsequent tone presentations similar to mixer control definitions Only the tone definition results in the presentation of a sine wave tone Tone definition This type is the default type and results in the presentation of the sine wave tone when used with the ST trial command Syntax LeftPitch RightPitch LeftPitch Frequency in Hertz of left source or mono source RightPitch Freque
30. ck BEGIN_ is executed in the first data row of each file before normal block END is executed in the last data row of each file after normal block FINAL ___is executed in the last data row of the last file after normal and END block 8 3 4 SHOWLIST A new SHOWLIST command simplifies the creation of output tables that list data from multiple files Similar to the OUTPUT command you may list several text vaiables which will be included in the output list as columns Global delimiter and justification settings are used Syntax SHOWLIST varnamel varname2 varnameN ERTSCODE produces one label line and then one output line per file Using the E option you may redirect this output into a file In contrast to the OUTPUT command you are completely free to arrange and include certain statistical parameters To extract parameters from an factorial anaylsis declare a text variable and assign the value to this variable within an END_block COLUMN MeankRt 10 END COMPUTE MeanRt CELL Mean Response Correct 8 4 Incompatibilities to older ERTS versions e New DROPOUT session command substitutes the Block randomization modes 4 and 5 These modes ar not supported anymore Page 26 New Features from October 5 2003 e The meaning of the Sequence argument of the FB command has been slightly changed e The Level 1 argument of the CC trial command Change color now manipulates the first loaded foreground color and not necessarily the
31. e RUNBLOCK session command Drop Out modes are not longer one variant of the randomization modes but can be defined independent of the randomisation mode with the new DROPOUT session command This command enables or disables drop out mode for all subsequent RUNBLOCK commands Syntax DROPOUT ValMode TstMode ValRep TstRep Mode Determines the drop out mode for valid trials Val and WarmUp trials Tst No drop out mode default One drop out run without storing incorrect trials Dropout run with storing all trials Max number of trials is n x N Trials Rep Determines how incorrect trials are repeated for valid Val and WarmUp trials Tst O repeat at end of block default Page 42 New Features from October 5 2003 1 repeat immediately The separation of drop out mode and randomization mode allows the user to combine all drop out modes with all randomization modes which was not possible before that The block randomization modes 4 and 5 will be not longer supported 11 1 12 New Hercules session monitoring An online session monitoring HERCLOG is now supported with dual monitor hardware configurations The experimentator can permanently watch the status of the session on the monochrome monitor The session monitoring is activated by the following new command line option M n Activates hercules session monitoring Erase HERCLOG at end of session and return to DOS 2 Blink and wait for key press at end of session F
32. e needed to sample the joystick position The later determines the timing resolution of MJ and MM When starting TESTJOY the current joystick position is interpreted as the center position Page 8 New Features from October 5 2003 2 New to ERTS V3 32 2 1 Length dependent exposure time for single word presentation Using the new SETCHARTIME session command you can lengthen the presentation of each single word presented by the SW trial commnad depending on the number of characters in the word For example if presentation time of a word is defined as 1000ms by the SP command and the word consists of 6 characters the overall exposure time would be 1000ms plus 6 x CharTime Syntax SETCHARTIME CharTime Time Extra time for each character in ms default 0 2 2 Coding CE in trials called by SW command The manual describes incorrectly the behavior of CE in combination with CritWord SW command If CritWord is set to a value greater than 0 and lower than 10000 the CritWord marks one of the words as critical If a CE command is used in the presentation trial ERTS will send the first byte of the sequence for all non critical words and the 2nd byte for the critical Using this mode the first byte may be used to reset the port and the second to raise a data line A trigger will be seen only on the critical word _ SEQUENCE OneWord B nnnnnnnO nnnnnnnt If the first byte sets one data line and the second another data line you will see trig
33. e words at a fixed rate SP Center 1 This SP will present one single word if called from SW ST 500 100 O A tone with each word just for fun LB Loading border to avoid preloading between SP and ST CT Clear tone after 100 ms CS 200 Show Pic for another 100 ms TRIAL ShowFixed SF Nice CS 1000 SW FS O 1 Fixed FS IMPORTANT Name of trial must not be variable if trial requires a VarArgList 11 1 4 Support of additional screen images with standard ERTS Like ERTSVIPL standard ERTS now also supports the trial commands LI SI and TI to load and display selected full screen images in addition to the automatic IPL double buffers Consequently you may use additional images in the same way for realizing tachistoscopic displays with both versions of ERTS Color manipulation technique is not necessary anymore see section 7 5 of the User s manual Unlike ERTSVIPL standard ERTS offers always up to two additional screen images independent of avail able video RAM While screen images are loaded multiple foreground colors cannot be realized Thus clear CS unused screen images if you want to display multiple color screens after using the additional image 11 1 5 Enhanced color palette updating features for ERTSVIPL For updating the 256 color palette without writing a new picture bitmap the following features have been implemented new CP trial command Change Palette new picture subtype c and enhanced CC trial command fo
34. efinition which contains keys to be coded ByteSequ Name of a byte sequence which contains bytes for each of the keys default none ToneSet Name of a set which contains tone definitions for each of the keys default none 8 2 4 Strobe like sync signals The new CE and CODEEVENT commands will write a byte directly to the parallel port In some cases it might be useful to turn these signals into short strobe signals by resetting the port after a short delay This may be achieved by setting an appropriate ERTSTTLRESET DOS environment entry SET ERTSTTLRESET Delay Invert Delay Length of Strobe in Microseconds No millisecond A Null byte will be send to reset the port Invert This argument may be used to invert all bit patterns 0 Use NULL to reset the strobe signal default 1 Invert all Sequence definitions and use FF hex to reset the strobe signal Note that all parallel port output including the signals from CODEKEYS and SS commands are converted into a strobe signal 8 2 5 SHOWTTL utility With the SHOWTTL utility you may debug and verify the correct sending of ERTS sync signals For this you must connect your ERTS computers via parallel cable e g LapLink cable with another PC While running an ERTS script which includes sync signals you may run SHOWTTL on the other receiving computer and watch the timing of incoming signals in millisecond resolution Note that you must run SHOWTTL not within a MS DOS box in order to obtain
35. end of trial Page 32 New Features from October 5 2003 10 1 3 Aborting block with STOPKEY session command The STOPKEY session command now supports not only PC keyboard but all input devices except voicekey Besides interrupting a running session this command may now also be used to abort a running block Syntax STOPKEY StopKey Trial VarArgList Trial Name of trial definition that is executed to interrupt the session If null then no trial will be executed and the running block will be immediately aborted even within a trial Trials up to this moment are recorded 10 1 4 New behavior of MAXTIME If the MAXTIME session command is used to abort blocks then the block will be immediately aborted within the running trial Previously MAXTIME waited until the end of the running trial The aborted trial is not recorded 10 1 5 New ET End Trial trial command To abort a running trial depending on the response of the subject the new ET trial command has been implemented The command can only be used as a FB alternative within a FB command or within a trial called by a FB command Syntax ET Mode Mode 1 Abort trial 2 Abort trial and repeat immediately 10 1 6 Support of VESA VBE V2 0 video modes in ERTSVIPL To support other resolutions than the predefined ERTS video modes the selection of a video mode may now be given based on the resolution instead of the video number The syntax of the command line option H has
36. experimental session Two mono VOC files are mixed to left right stereo channels with a user defined delay of one channel MERGEVOC can be called MERGEVOC supports all sampling rates and uncompressed 8 16 bit format Sound samples must consist of one data block only Both mono input files must have the same format with respect to sampling rate and bits per sample MERGEVOC can be called batch like in quiet mode to generate sound samples for an experi mental session If number of combinations exceeds disk space experimental sessions must be split into sub sets Same functionality will be implemented in ERTS in one of the next releases by a new trial command that merges two mono sound files into one output stereo file Syntax MERGEVOC left voc right voc out voc SOA q Left voc Name of VOC file for left channel Right voc Name of VOC file for right channel Out voc Name of output VOC file SOA Delay between channels in ms negative means left first q Optional option for suppressing system messages 11 6 ERTSLIC Serialization The new version of ERTSLIC now supports deinstallation as well ERTSLIC Remove Remove Current license will be removed from the machine When removing a license ERTSLIC will generate a deinstallation number that must be reported to your local distributor for confirming deinstallation ATTENTION New serializations require new serial numbers that will by supplied by your local distributor only Deinstallation n
37. f positions on line 0 Equally spaced i gt 0 Sine distributed 8 1 2 Embedded color commands within text picture The picture type F Feedback picture has been extended to support embedded color format fields using the similar notation as the embedded feedback fields For changing foreground color within the picture use the following syntax Set Color Ccolor Reset Color C The C is used to differentiate between embedded color format field uniquely and feedback fields For setting a new foreground color append the name of the color definition and a trailing symbol New Features from October 5 2003 Page 23 8 2 New EEG Version of ERTS Since ERTS version 3 25 EEG syncing has been improved by adding new commands but at the same time EEG syncing has been removed from the standard version of ERTS and ERTSVIPL EEG syncing is now only available with the license extension for EEG With earlier versions of ERTS a sync signal had to be defined by inserting an SS command immediately after the corresponding presentation command In order to execute this SS command virtually simultanuous with the stimulus presentation the time of the presentation command had to be set to Null and possible intermediate pre loading activies had to be ruled out by setting a LB command after the SS The new commands simplify this procedure 8 2 1 CE Code Event trial command The CE trial command defines a single byte pattern that will be send t
38. for the key among all key presses default 1 Interpret multiple key presses as a input sequence and compare with key sequence within Key KeyIndex Selects a single key press within multiple responses for comparison 0 Compare all key presses default gt 0 Compare i th key press Key Name of predefined key or name of key definition which is matched against key presses to trigger execution of trial command Page 28 New Features from October 5 2003 The following example demonstrates how the new TransPos command and the OK command may be used to define a point amp click response mode with sensitive key symbols on the screen that flashes in response to a click RETRACE 1 COLOR Blue C 240 100 100 COLOR Gray C 0 0 50 White C O O 100 SCREENCOLOR White Gray PICTURE Boris N PICTURE Becker N PICTURE Steffi N PICTURE Graf N PICTURE Michael N eats Jackson N Jakin Whitney N PICTURE Houston N PICTURE _ T PICTURE T PICTURE OnTarget P 00001100000 00001100000 00001100000 00001100000 11111111111 11111111111 00001100000 00001100000 00001100000 00001100000 PICTURE OffTarget P 1111111111 1111111111 100000011 0000001 1 0000001 1 00000011 00000011 0000001 1 11 11 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 111111 1 111111 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 SET Cursor V OffTarget OnTarget KEY KeyTbl 1234 POSITION KeyPos M 0 500 500 500 4 1 POSITION StartPos P O 200 POSITION Center P 0 0 TRIAL ShowNames CS 2000 RK ML
39. ger for every word _ SEQUENCE EveryWord B nnnnnnn1 nnnnnnin In this case you need to set ERTSTTLRESET in order to reset each signal automatically else you will not see any changes on the port when repeated non critical words are presented which will be always the case If CritWord is set to 10000 ERTS will change in ascending mode and will try to send triggers with each word by selecting bytes in ascending order out of the sequence definition SEQUENCE EveryWord B nnnn00O1 nnnn0O10 nnnn0O11 nnnnO100 nnnnO101 nnnnO110 nnnnO111 nnnn1000 nnnn1001 2 3 Trial transition matrix for generating constrained trial orders To generate trial orders which are non random but rather follow individual transition rules one or more trial transition matrices can be defined that determine the probability of trial orders Use numeric SETs to define a trial transition matrix The number of rows and columns must correspond to the number of trial specifications of a block definition If the i th trial specification of a block has been executed the i th row of the matrix will be used to draw the subsequent trial Each column either includes 1 or excludes 0 trial specification from the set of possible subsequent trials If for example column j in row i contains a 0 then trial specification j will never follow trial specification i Trial transition matrices can defined for up to 10 levels which means that you can include or exclude trial specifications depend
40. in the trial sequence New Features from October 5 2003 Page 15 5 3 Serial Output EEG Version only The output channel of the SS trial command and of all EEG syncing commands can now be defined as serial output channels The channel numbers 1 4 that are specified as an argument in the trial or session commands usually correspond to the LPT1 4 You can overwrite this assignment in the ERTS CFG file using the ERTSCFG configuration program To define one of the channels as a serial output channel a new SERIALPORT command has been implemented 5 3 1 SERIALPORT The SERIALPORT command is a global system command which is usually placed at near the beginning of a script file It assigns one of the four output channels to one of the serial COM ports of your computer Syntax SERIALPORT Channel COM Baud Bit StopBit Parity DTR Channel Number of channel 1 4 to be used for serial output COM Number of COM port 1 3 Baud Baud rate 2400 4800 9600 Bit Format 5 6 7 8 StopBit 1 2 Parity 0 None 1 Odd 2 Even DTR Use Data Ready Flag 0 No 1 Yes 5 4 External definition file for key names of PC keyboard The table of pre defined ERTS key names has been separated from the ERTS program to allow users to localize key names for different keyboard layouts and to overwrite key names for assigning special screen echo characters to keyboard keys The standard name of the key definition file is ERTS KEY This key must be present in either
41. ing of what trial specification has been executed ten trials before New Features from October 5 2003 Page 9 The trial transition mode is activated by inserting a TRANSMAT session command before a RUNBLOCK command Syntax TRANSMAT Mode Matl Mat2 Mat10 Mode Mat Generation mode Random selection with replacement from transition matrix Random selection without replacement of trial specification If empty the set of trial specifications will be resetted automatically This mode enforces usage of all trial specifications 2 Balanced selection ERTS will generate a random sequence with equal frequencies for all trials specifications This mode guarantees that all trials are replicated by the same number 3 Mode 1 and 2 Name of numeric set which defines a trial transition matrix Matrix 1 defines probability depending on trial i 1 matrix 10 for i 10 The following example creates a random trial order that follows the following rules If an odd trial specification 1 3 5 7 9 is executed the next trial specification will be randomly drawn from the second part of the block definition 6 to 10 If an even trial specification 2 4 6 8 10 is executed the next trial specification will be randomly drawn from the first half of the block definition 1 to 5 The same trial specification never follows each other SET TTM1 N 0111100000 0000011111 1101100000 0000011111 1111000000 0000001111 1111100000 0000011011
42. interval In addition to the exponential random time interval the CS command now supports the definition of an equi distant random time interval Whenever MaxRnd is less or equal to RndTime ERTS will interpret these values as follows RndTime Time range that should be varied at random MaxRnd Divisor for creating equi distant time intervals within this range For example if MaxRnd 4 and RndTime 4000 then five different time values are generated at random 0 1000 2000 3000 4000 1 10 Defining Sets of Sets The SET command now supports the definition of sets that exists of sets The new sub type for this new type of element is E 1 11 Extended RK command The RK command has been extended by two arguments Syntax RK Key MaxRt N Keys Skey EndKey Echo Reset AutoRep DblKey AutoRep Auto repetition mode for PC keyboard and EXKEY For PC keyboard the autorep rate is determined by BIOS setting For external keys EXKEY the value sets the start delay in msec If a key is pressed longer than AutoRep msec ERTS will start to auto repeat that key press with increasing rate default is 0 no auto rep DblKey If you register multiple responses N Keys gt 1 and this flag is set to zero each key can only be used once default 1 1 12 Removing parallel element If no element is specified in the RE command then the element with the same index that has been used by the most recent DE command will be removed from the set
43. ion command If a parameter is not a numeric value like time or PosIndex but rather represents an array of names several pictures of different sizes then create a SET consisting of those objects and use the index argument of the DE trial command to select the i th element out of the set 7 2 1 New STAIRCASE Data object For running staircases within a block you must first define a staircase object which holds basic parameters of your staircase process such as the start value and UpDown characteristics STAIRCASE Name _ StartAfterTurn EndOnTurn DivOnTurn DivByTrial RepeatDown RepeatUp AverageTurns AutoReset IndexFile Name Name of new staircase object StartAfterTurn Number of turns until internal averaging begins A null starts averaging immediately Note that this parameter is only relevant if you use the SETSCASE or FIXSCASE session commands EndOnTurn Index of turn at which a running block should be suspended Use this parameter to abort a block depending on the number of turns of your UpDown process A block will not be aborted until all running Staircases are suspended DivOnTurn Number of turns at which step values will be divided by two A null disables division DivByTrial Determines whether step sizes should be divided by trial number 0 No 1 Yes divide by number of trials Note that if DivOnTurn is also active DivByTrial will start with N Trl 1 after DivOnTurn ends Page 20 New Features from October 5 2003 RepeatDown
44. irst key press stops blinking second key press returns to DOS 5 11 1 13 Slightly changed meanings of statistics within feedback picture The Pt statistic Percent total now represents the percentage of executed trials in relation to the total number of trials in the session If a trial does not contain any FB command latencies will be assigned to totals but neither to correct nor to false 11 1 14 Extended FB command The meaning of the Sequential and Begin End argument has been extended Sequential Determines how input is compared to correct keys in multiple key input situations Correct is true if one of the reponses matches one of the correct keys 1 Correct is true if the order of input corresponds to order of correct keys i gt 1 Compare only i th input with correct keys Begin End Determines which latency will be compared in multiple key input situations 0 Use first registered input 1 Use last registered input 2 Use difference between last and first registered input 11 1 15 New optional prompts The default flag of the PROMPT system command has been extended to support optional input in response to prompts default Determines default mode of prompt 0 No default value 1 Suggest default value 2 Use default value without prompting used in combination with PARAMETER command New Features from October 5 2003 Page 43 1 No default value prompt is optional and may be answered just by pressing RETURN key 11 1 16
45. lock and continue the session definition Note that the randomization mode must be 0 when you use absolute trial branching and 0 or 3 if you use relative trial branching 7 1 5 AP Allign Picture trial command This trial command may be used to change the default centering on screen locations when displaying pictures AP Mode Mode Determines allignment of pictures 0O Centered default and ERTS standard 1 Left alligned 2 Right alligned New Features from October 5 2003 Page 19 3 Allignment depends on X coordinate Right if in left half of screen Left if in right half of screen Centered if in horizontal middle of screen You may concatenate the AL command with other SP and SF trial commands to load pictures with different allignments as one complex image 7 2 StairCases The implementation of staircases within ERTS is not simple because ERTS does not support computation of variables Instead staircases in ERTS recalculate variable argument values of a block definitions The up down process is based on feedback classifications To achieve this you must follow these steps 1 Define a staircase with the proper basic characteristics 2 Define a trial with the staircase relevant parameter as a variable parameter 3 Add a feedback command that classifies the response 4 Initialize the starting values of the staircase by using the INITSCASE command 5 Link the staircase the a variable parameter column by using the USESCASE sess
46. mode to MS DOS 10 New to ERTS V3 23 10 1 General ERTS commands 10 1 1 User defined FB classes for DROPOUT mode The definition of drop out modes for blocks has been extended to support user defined classification of correct false responses with respect to the twelve pre defined FB classes Syntax DROPOUT ValMode TstMode ValRep TstRep FB1 FB12 Mode Determines the drop out mode for valid trials Val and WarmUp trials Tst 0 No drop out mode default 1 One drop out run without storing incorrect trials 1 Dropout run with storing all trials Max number of trials is n x N Trials n gt Rep Determines how incorrect trials are repeated for valid Val and WarmUp trials Tst O repeat at end of block default 1 repeat immediately FB Determines which FB class should be dropped O Repeat default for all FB classes except 2 1 Drop default for FB class 2 The separation of drop out mode and randomization mode allows the user to combine all drop out modes with all randomization modes which was not possible before that The block randomization modes 4 and 5 will be not longer supported 10 1 2 New cancel mode for nested trials The cancel flag of the RT Run Trial trial command has been extended to support abortion of nested trials at the end of a trial Syntax RT Trial Loops Cancel Voice RndLoop VarArgList Cancel 0 Do not abort 1 Immediate response dependent abortion 2 Response dependent abortion at
47. n and depending on the subject number the corresponding session definition is selected ERTS will display the selected group after you have typed in the subject number Note that the GROUP command must be placed behind the session definitions because the command is referring to these definitions 1 3 Choosing blank character for screen echo In the SE trial command you can now specify any symbol in addition to the underscore as the blank character Syntax SE Position PosNo Font Case FieldChar FieldChar 0 for blank 1 for underscore gt 1 decimal value of the ASCII character to be used as fieldchar Page 2 New Features from October 5 2003 1 4 Limiting key coding to registration period The CODEKEYS only ERP Version introduces an additional parameter for limiting key coding sending sync signals upon key presses to periods of active response registration RK command Syntax CODEKEY Channel Keys ByteSequ ToneSet RegOnly RegOnly 0 code any key action during session 1 code only key action within active response registration periods 1 5 Managing bonus points For counting and displaying bonus points ERTS has a special internal numerical bonus counter This counter can be initialized or increased decreased using the BO trial command Syntax BO Operation Amount FbWidth Precision Operation 0 Initialize internal counter with amount 1 Add amount to current value 2 Subtract amount from current value 3 Add Rt depe
48. ncy in Hertz of right source Because the FM chip of the SoundBlaster card cannot programmed to any frequency there is a new command line option for displaying the frequency that is realized by the FM chip Syntax Ih Info about Hertz Volume definition This type sets the attenuation of each source in units of 75 dB A Null means maximum volume and a 63 means 47 25 dB attenuation Syntax LeftAttenutation RightAttenuation LeftAttenuation 0 63 volume of left source or mono source in units of 75dB default is 0 max volume RightAttenuation 0 63 volume of right source in units of 75dB default is left attenuation Source definition This type selects the source of sine wave tones Syntax Source 0 Mono 1 Right stereo source 2 Left Stereo source 3 Both stereo sources How left right frequency and volume settings will be interpreted depends on the selected source If mono is selected only the LeftAttentuation and LeftPitch arguments are used to define the mono tone If only one of the stereo channels is selected only the corresponding arguments will be considered Stereo sources require two OPL2 chips or one OPL3 chip Page 34 New Features from October 5 2003 10 1 8 Frequency based VoiceKey The ERTS voicekey has been enhanced to support frequency based thresholds as well A zero crossing threshold may be specified by two parameters MaxCross the number of zero crossings and MinAmp the smallest amplitude size that a s
49. ndent value value Rt value Amount Numerical positive value If precision is larger than 0 then the n right digits will be interpreted as decimal places e g if precision 2 then 1050 will be interpreted as 10 50 FBWidth 0 Do not store bonus value in FB colum n gt 0 Store bonus value in FB column and set with of FB column to n characters Precision 0 Interpret value as defined n gt 0 Interpret the n right numbers as decimal places The default width of FB columns is 3 characters If your bonus points are greater or equal to 1000 than you need to set width of 4 or higher 1 6 Displaying bonus points Bonus points are displayed using special placeholders in a formatted picture definition see PICTURE command with subtype F BBBB Display last amount bbbb Display current points 1 7 Displaying time of block Additional place holders in formatted pictures support the display of the elapsed or residual block execution time ttttt Display elapsed block execution time in seconds New Features from October 5 2003 Page 3 TTTT Display remaining block execution time in seconds MAXTIME must be active 1 8 User defined token delimiter for single word presentation The following session command defines a token delimiter other than blank SETSWDELIM AsciiVal AsciiVal Numerical Value which is the decimal equivalent of the character that should be used as the delimiter 1 9 Extended CS command for equi distant random time
50. nential random time interval the CS command now supports the definition of an equi distant random time interval Whenever MaxRnd is less or equal to RndTime ERTS will intepret these values as follows RndTime Time range that should be varied at random MaxRnd Number of different random time intervals within this range For example if MaxRnd 5 and RndTime 4000 then five different equi distant time intervals are drawn at random 0 1000 2000 3000 4000 Page 14 New Features from October 5 2003 5 2 External Counter EEG Version only Typical MRI settings require that trial and block execution is synchronized by the scan periods of the MRI To support such a scan paced execution mode a new set of commands is supported in the EEG version that let you define a counter which is based on external tics These external tics will usually be TTL scan signals from the MRI which are integrated via the EXKEY interface 5 2 1 EXCOUNTER session command This command defines the external counter by defining a key input as the external tic If you define one of the EXKEY keys E1 E16 as the counter tic you can define an external TTL signal as the source of the counter Syntax EXCOUNTER key Key One of the pre defined key names default is no key 5 2 2 MAXCOUNT session command The MAXCOUNT session command defines a maximum block or trial execution time in terms of external tics Use this command to limit the duration of a trial or block to a
51. ng of incoming signals in millisecond resolution Note that you must run SHOWTTL not within a MS DOS box in order to obtain accurate measurements SHOWTTL port T W byte Port Number of parallel port LPT 1 2 3 4 T Show time markers only Use T if screen updating of SHOWTTL takes longer than intervals between signals W_ Write byte value Dec to parallel port Use this option to write send a byte to a parallel port e g to test the connections between the two computers or to reset a port 5 6 ERTSCODE 5 6 1 EXCLUDE A new EXCLUDE command allows filtering of values that are out of a range whereas the range is computed by using all data The command functions similar to the SKIP command but causes ERTSCODE to process each file in two phases In phase one the EXCLUDE command is not executed thus all data are processed and all statistics are computed based on the entire data set In phase two the EXCLUDE command is processed thus data that do not meet the WHERE condition are excluded Syntax EXCLUDE WHERE condition Note that in order to function as a two phase exclusion criteria you must compute variables based on the Statistical analysis of the first phase This is typically done by using END COMPUTE statements to set the variables NUMERIC Mini NUMERIC Maxi EXCLUDE WHERE num R1 GT Maxi OR num R1 LT Mini END COMPUTE Mini END COMPUTE Maxi CELL Mean CELL STDV CELL Mean CELL STDV 5 6 2 Extended E
52. o the parallel port at the time the next visual or auditory event starts As the sync signal will be sent automatically with the following event the signal cannot be delayed by internal pre loading of images CE sequence Channel Sequence Name of a byte sequence containg one single byte Channel Number of output channel LPT 1 2 3 4 The byte will be directly written to the port without any handshake this corresponds to Bios mode 1 in the SS command CE StimOn RK ResKEys SP Center 10 1 8 2 2 CODEEVENTS session command This session command lets you define automatic sync signals for curtain sub sets of trial events on the session level Using this session command you do not need to alter your trial definitions CODEEVENTS Channel ResetSequ RtSequ FBSequ VisualSequ AudiSequ ParSequ Channel Number of LPT output channel default 1 ResetSequ Name of a sequence that is sent at the beginning of each trial RtSequ Name of a sequence that is sent at the beginning of response registration FBSequ Name of a sequence that contains several bytes which are send for each FB class VisualSequ Name of a sequence that contains several bytes which are send with the i th visual event AudiSequ Name of a sequence that contains several bytes which are sent with the i th auditory event ParSequ Name of a sequence that contains several bytes which are sent with the i th parallel output All of these arguments can be set to NULL to use only a sub
53. ou want to display multiple instances of the same video at the same time e g as distractors Note that you can only copy pictures that have been defined with subtype m 4 1 2 New PV Play Video trial command The PV trial command plays all videos that have been loaded with previous SP or FP commands If you insert a WK command between the SP and PV command the first frame of a video will be visible and the subject can start the video by pressing a key Syntax PV MaxTime Cancel NFrames Continue Speed FrameSync Time Max duration of video sequence Cancel Cancel mode NFrames Number of frames to be played use this to run only a subset of the video Continue 0 Unload all vidoes after PV is finished 1 Hold all videos for a second PV command The default is 0 Use this argument if you want to interrupt a video or do some intermittent activities Speed Speed in millisecond that overwrites default speed Default is 0 use default speed FrameSync Play video by using constant multiples of screen refresh periods instead of millisecond timing This mode is recommended if you want to exactly sync the frame rate of two parallel videos or if you prefer to display a video synchronized to the screen refresh instead of realizing the exact video speed Page 12 New Features from October 5 2003 4 1 3 New VA Video Attributes trial command The VA trial command may be used to modify and extend the atrtibutes of a single video Synt
54. ound sample must exceed to be counted as zero crossing A zero crossing algorithm detects high frequency noise even at volume levels below the volume threshold for example the early detection of spoken words like Five Seven will be improved The theoretical resolution of the ERTS on line zero crossing algorithm is about 5 ms The VoiceKey parameters may be permanently specified within the ERTS configuration file or by using the new VOICEKEY system command within an ERTS script Syntax VOICEKEY MaxVol MaxCross MinVol MaxVol Volume threshold 0 127 default 25 A null turns off volume based threshold MaxCross Frequency threshold 0 65535 default 25 A null turns off frequency based threshold A value of 30 50 is a reasonable value see TESTVKEY utility MinVol Minimum volume threshold for counting zero crossings 0 127 default 2 The VOICEKEY command overrides settings stored in the ERTS CFG file see ERTSCFG configuration utility 10 1 9 Extended FONT command to reduce memory usage The FONT command has been extended by a optional argument to list used characters If this argument is appended on the font definition ERTS will only load bitmaps for characters included in this list Use this new argument to reduce the amount of conventional memory needed to run a script The blank character dec 32 is always loaded Syntax FONT Name FontFile Ext Size Points Comp LineSpace CharSpace UsedChars UsedChars
55. ping Video until key is pressed PICTURE myVideo Vr _ video flc POSITION Center P 0 0 TRIAL Play SP myVideo Center RK PV O 1 New Features from October 5 2003 Page 13 Visual search using small videos l PICTURE Target Vm target flc PICTURE Dist1 Wm distract flc PICTURE Dist2 Vc _ Dist1 PICTURE Dist3 Vc _ Dist1 PICTURE Dist4 Vc Dist1 PICTURE Dist5 Vc Dist1 PICTURE Dist6 Vc Dist1 PICTURE Dist7 Vc _ Dist1 PICTURE Dist8 Vc Dist1 SET Distractors V Dist1 Dist2 Dist3 Dist4 Dist5 Dist6 Dist7 Dist8 POSITION Circle P 0 0 800 0 8 TRIAL Play MP Circle RK FP Circle 1 O Distractors O 1 PV O 1 BLOCK Vsearch 2 1 Play Target 1 Play Dist1 5 New to ERTS V3 29 5 1 General ERTS commands 5 1 1 Parameter Values in command line The PARAMETER command without a value definition lets you specify values when you start an experimental session You may now add values in the command line as well to support batch execution mode Syntax amp value The amp symbol marks command line arguments as parameter values The order must correspond to the PARAMETER commands in the script 5 1 2 TONE command supports WAV format The SoundBlaster support has been extended to the WAV file format You must include the file extension WAV when defining a tone To play WAV files the Creative Labs DOS drivers CTWMEM DRV and CTWDSK DRV must be present 5 1 3 Extended CS command for equi distant random time interval In addition to the expo
56. r acoustic sig nals to keystrokes Syntax KEYCODE KeySet ToneSet ByteSequ Channel Bios KeySet Name of a key definition which contains keys to be coded ToneSet Name of a set which contains tone definitions for each of the keys default none Page 40 New Features from October 5 2003 ByteSequ Name of a byte sequence which contains bytes for each of the keys default none Channel Channel number 1 4 translated by ERTSCFG to parallel port numbers Default 1 Bios Determines handshake see SS command default 0 After activating key coding ERTS will send the i th byte from ByteSequ to the parallel port if the i th key within KeySet is pressed In the same way the i th tone definition within ToneSet will be played If ToneSet or ByteSequ contain less members than KeySet the largest available entry will be selected Thus if you want to code all keys with the same byte you may define a ByteSequ containing only this single byte Note that key coding happens independent from the trial events which means that during the entire session keys will be coded until another KEYCODE command disable key coding or until end of session To code the release of a key you must simply include the release code for that key in KeySet For setting single bits it is important to use masked byte definitions see SEQUENCE data command SEQUENCE CodeSequ B nnnnnnin nnannnnOn nnnnnnnt1 nnnnnnnd KEY CodeKeys SHL SHL SHR SHR SET CodeTones T 4
57. r overwriting any of the 256 color palette entries directly New CP trial command Syntax CP Picture Time Cancel Offset Default Time 0 Cancel 0 Offset 0 New Features from October 5 2003 Page 39 Picture Name of BMP or RLE graphics picture whose color palette should be used to update ERTS system color palette Picture may be of subtype c Time Time that will be waited after updating palette Cancel Cancel mode Offset Offset 0 255 within system palette When updating 16 color bitmaps you must find the correct offset within the dynamic color palette 16 color palettes are assigned to the internal system palette in units of 16 entries ERTS loads multiple 16 color bit maps in ascending order beginning with offset 0 if no 256 color bitmap is used somewhere in the experi ment or beginning with offset 16 if 256 color images are used Thus the 16 color palette which you want to update might be located at offset 0 16 32 and so on depending on the order it was loaded for preparing this particular screen image If color palette of picture bitmaps are identical they will share the same system palette entries New picture subtype C For defining a color palette only without picture bitmap you may use the new subtype c in combination with the G picture type and the BMP or RLE file format ERTS will only load the color table but not the bitmap You therefore may use this picture definition only for the CP comm
58. rement sentence word wise similar to mode 2 in OR mode Use this mode if mode 2 in combination with OR mode is not suitable e g if masking is turned on Page 38 New Features from October 5 2003 SWmask Name of a pitcure set which contains one or two pictures as elements These pictures are used for cuing or masking word locations The first picture within the set definition will be used for forthcoming sentence positions The second picture if defined for past words To disable masking comletely use a hyphen SWTrial Name of trial that should be executed for each word Corresponds to the body of the loop which cycles through one sentence Details like fixed rate or self paced presenta tion must be defined in this trial The SP command that presents TextPic splits auto matically the contents into word tokens If a WV command is used within this trial then ERTS will automatically overwrite the marker value with the single word loop counter If a VOC file with markers behind each word is started prior to the SW command then single word presentation can be timed by marker values Markers must begin with 1 and increment by 1 VarArgList Values for variable trial arguments Typically the TextPic will be one variable argu ment Example T PICTURE FS T This sentence is presented at a fixed rate with superimposed words POSITION Center P O O sample trial definition for fixed presentation TRIAL Fixed This trial will present singl
59. ries Their name is KEY nnn where nnn is the country Each line in the key definition file assigns one key name to an internal keyboard scan code Page 30 New Features from October 5 2003 ScanCode KeyName See the standard keyboard file for the meaning of the scancodes For overwriting key names you may create partial definition files which only assign new names to task relevant scancodes You must not define duplicate names The following keyboard file assigns dummy names to the digit keys 1 4 to make the names available and then assigns the digit names to the keyboard keys A X M L Now you could use these keys as response keys which produce the symbols 1 2 3 4 as screen echo 2 D1 3 D2 4 D3 5 D4 30 1 45 2 50 3 38 4 9 3 ERTS and MS Windows 95 Win95 provides much better support for activating DOS applications from within Windows than Win 3 x You can start DOS applications in a DOS box protected mode or in real mode MS DOS which causes a complete unloading of Win95 and re loading after finishing the DOS application It also supports a boot menu for booting real mode DOS directly ERTS will only be accurate in real mode MS DOS but will also run in protected mode MS DOS within a full screen DOS box In the later case timing and screen sync will be accurate enough for testing experiment definitions 9 3 1 Activating ERTS from within Win95 Create a short cut and edit properties actually editing PIF files Set Full
60. rom October 5 2003 Page 7 1 22 Additional columns in result file Two new columns Wn and Rn will be generated when you use the MM or MJ commands For each radius one column will be produced Rn Latency of crossing boundaries Xn X coordinate of joystick Yn Y coordinate of joysticks Dn Radius of joysticks Wn Angle of joystick Tn Key name mapped to target zones 1 23 Using Joystick keys The WK command also handles J1 and J2 The RK command also handles J1 and J2 to measure latencies but the same restrictions exist like for MM and MJ which means that only the next trial command is executed and then ERTS waits for a joystick response There is no continuation and no internal pre loading of images before the response is made 1 24 Calibration of joystick coordinates The SETSTICK session command and the AS trial command have been extended to support vertical calibration as well Syntax SETSTICK center left right top bottom Syntax AS Key PosFlag PosFlag Determines what position will be checked 1 left Xmin center X Y middle right Xmax top Ymin bottom Ymax nA WN The new session command STICKANGLE can be used to set range of overall movement in terms of angle position Syntax STICKANGLE Xangle Yangle Xangle Overall horizontal range from left to right Yangle Overall vertical range from top to bottom 1 25 Test utility TESTJOY This utility display the current coordinates radius and angle and the tim
61. s e g Pixel GRA Rotated pictures If more than two pictures are in the set of pictures the i 1 th picture will be used to signal on target status on the i th position If you use a touch pad as input device it makes no sense to define a screen cursor StrtPos Position definition which sets the start location of the mouse cursor ClickMode Sets visual feedback to click responses recommended for multiple response registration N Key gt 1 0 No feedback default 1 Inverse sensitive area while button finger is down 2 Clear sensitive area ClickPic Optional set definition with one or more simple 2 color bitmap pictures which will be displayed as feedback on the corresponding position If more than one picture is in the set of picture the i th picture will be used to signal on target status on the i th position To disable the translation of positions use TP trial command or TRANSPOS session command without arguments You may use the new OK trial command to define visual feedback for each response location key name 9 1 3 New OK trial command OnKey for key dependent feedback As an extension to the FB trial command which allows response dependent feedback to categories such as correct false the OK trial command supports the definition of feedback to particular response keys OK Sequential KeyIndex Keyl Trialcommand Key2 Trialcommand KeyN Trialcommand Sequential Determines the way multiple responses are compared 0 Look
62. s a constant value to a variable argument column of a block definition The value is derived by the staircase s current mean and some delta You can use this session command to create a set of constant values for a subsequent block centered around a staircase s mean In other words this command enables you to adjust the method of constant stimuli individually by running a staircase block first SETSCASE Name Delta Block VarArgIndex BlkStart BlkStep BlkEnd Name Name of staircase to use Delta A Delta value which is added to the staircase s mean Block Name of the block definition where values should be written to VarArgIndex Index of variable argument column within the block BlkStart Step End If these values are not null the values will only be written to trial specifications beginning with BlkStart incrementing in BlkSteps and ending at BlkEnd 7 2 5 STOPSCASE session comand This command disable an active staircase that has been enabled by a USESCASE command STOPSCASE Name Name Name of staircase to stop 7 2 6 FIXSCASE session comand This command fixates the value of an active staircase according to its internal estimate The state of other active staircase s might be considered as well This staircase can be still active but the UpDown process will be stopped SETSCASE Namel Name2 Name3 Name4 Namel Name of staircase to fixate Name2 3 4 Name of staircase to use as additional source for averaging Page 22 New Fe
63. screen mode deactivate any Win95 key assignments set IDL time to low Real mode DOS accurate If you want to start ERTS in real mode DOS accurate set advanced program options to MS DOS In this case you even have the opportunity to define special CONFIG SYS and AUTOXEC BAT files e g loading DOS SoundBlaster drivers Protected mode DOS not accurate but comfortable If you want to start ERTS protected mode DOS not accurate but fast turn around then set the advanced program options to Mode suggested by Win95 default 9 3 2 Activating ERTS from the DOS prompt Selecting prompt mode from the boot menu 1 edit the file msdos sys in your boot directory by first removing the shr flags with ATTRIB and then editing the file with EDIT Insert BootMenu 1 into the option section This will activate the Win95 boot menu each time you start the computer You can select normal mode or prompt mode at this point same as pressing F8 during boot phase Restarting the computer in prompt mode 2 Select Shut down from in the Start menu of Win95 and select restart in prompt mode pressing SHIFT key while clicking on OK speeds restart up New Features from October 5 2003 Page 31 Creating a short cut for MS DOS in real mode 3 Create a second short cut in the start menu by copying the default MS DOS short cut in the start menu and rename this to e g Real MS DOS Then edit the advanced program options and set execution
64. set of these automatic event coding mechanisms The Reset and RtSequ must consist of only one single byte The FBSequ may consist of several bytes From those a corrponding byte is selected according to the feedback class The Visual Auditory and Par sequences may also consist of more than one byte If a trial consists of more than one event of a given modality then the bytes will be selected in ascending order If less bytes are defined than events the highest available byte will be used Page 24 New Features from October 5 2003 T SEQUENCE Reset B 00000000 SEQUENCE RtSequ B nnnnnnnn1 SEQUENCE FBSequ B nnnnOO1n nnnnO10n nnnnO11n nnnn100n SESSION CODEEVENTS 1 Reset RtSequ FBSequ In this example a Null byte would be sent to port at the beginning of each trial With each event following a RK command Register Key the RtSequ sequence would be sent Each FB command would also sent one of the four FBSequ bytes depending of the feedback classification 1 4 8 2 3 CODEKEYS Modified KEYCODE command In order to provide an homogenous set of commands the KEYCODE command has been modified to match the syntax of the new CODEEVENTS command The channel argument now comes first and there is no Bios argument for setting the handshake CODEKEYS does now only support direct writing Syntax CODEKEYS Channel KeySet ByteSequ ToneSet Channel Channel number 1 4 translated by ERTSCFG into parallel port numbers Default 1 KeySet Name of a key d
65. standard foreground color e The KEYCODE session command is changed to CODEKEYS Syntax has been changed and only direct writing to port is supported corresponds to Bios 1 e Since ERTSCODE V3 08 numeric variables must be declared explictly by using the new NUMERIC keyword To use old style implicit declaration insert the new keyword IMPLICIT at the top of the ERTSCODE definition file 9 New to ERTS V3 24 9 1 General ERTS commands 9 1 1 Extended SETMSEARCH command for presenting any sequence of stimuli as dual task to tracking The SETMSEARCH and RUNMSEARCH commands have been extended to support the presentation of list of single stimuli There are two new arguments ForceEndOfTracking and ListMode ForceEndOfTracking control whether tracking time will be limited by length of stimulus list 0 No default 1 Yes tracking will stop after last item of dualtask has been presented Note that tracking time must be sufficient large to finish list but not too long because result areas are allocated for full length ListMode Determines presentation type of Target and Probe stimulus sets 0 Memory Search Use arguments TargSet as target and ProbeSet as probe sets for Sternberg memory search default 1 Randon list Present all items of ProbeSet in random order 2 Fixed List Present all items of ProbeSet in fixed order In ListModes gt 0 you may use the argument TargSet for coding items as positive items i e where response yes is correc
66. sy Center WP IsBusy SP WaitForReady WP IsReady 11 1 9 Extended I command line option The syntax and meaning of the I option has been changed The option is now meant to be a general info option Just as with the O option a second argument specifies the type of information requested Is Information about session structure previous T It Information about internal trial structure previous Tt If Information about font loading previously included in W Im Information about free memory Ix Information about extended memory allocation 11 1 10 Reduced program memory requirements The memory required by ERTS has been greatly reduced about 70KB by implementing a program overlay structure The overlay structure has been designed to avoid disk access during trial and block execution When loading experiment files you can reduce loading reloading overlays by grouping similar commands together within the experiment file e g all pictures all positions all trials all blocks session A side effect of the overlay manager is the allocation of an overlay cache in the extended memory If this causes memory problems you may reduce or disable the cache by defining the DOS environment entry MOVE XMS xxxx where xxxx is a four digit hexadecimal number gt 0000 specifying the size of the cache in KB To disable the cache use 0001 11 1 11 New DROPOUT session command The definition of drop out modes for blocks has been separated from th
67. t You must enumerate all items from ProbeSet which are positive items in the TargSet set definition TargSet may be set to NULL by setting a hyphen instead of a name to disable response classification 9 1 2 New support for mouse touchpad click responses The new TP TransPos trial or session command enables you to define click sensitive areas on the screen and to assign response key names to those screen areas TP Position KeyTbl Radius Height Cursor StrtPos ClickMode ClickPic Position Position definition which defines the center of sensitive screen locations New Features from October 5 2003 Page 27 KeyTbl Key definition which is used as the translation table between screen location and response key name A click on a position with index i will be coded with the i th key name within the key table Radius Radius of the sensitive areas in mm 10 If the next is argument Height is lt gt O then this argument will interpreted as horizontal width to describe a rectangular area instead of a circle Height Height of sensitive screen area This is optional and may be set to 0 to define circle like areas see previous argument Radius Cursor Optional set definition with one or more picture elements who are used as bitmaps for the mouse screen cursor The first picture defines the bitmap to signal off target status and the next picture s to signal on target status You must only use picture types which are simple 2 color bitmap
68. tepDown will be interpreted as multiples of one retrace period The Startvalue will be rounded to the closest multiple of refresh periods 7 2 3 USESCASE session comand This command activates a staircase and assigns it to a variable argument column of a block definition You must have initialized the staircase with INITSCASE before using it USESCASE Name VarArgIndex BlkStart BlkStep BlkEnd F1 F12 Name Name of staircase to use VarArgIndex gt 0 Index of the variable parameter column Note that this requires a homogenous structure with respect to variable arguments across trials within one block definition O The staircase values will be intepreted as a line index into a block definition Thus the staircase will walk through your block definition instead of varying the value of one variable argument New Features from October 5 2003 Page 21 BlkStart Step End If these values are not null the staircase will only be used for trial specifications beginning with BlkStart incrementing in BlkSteps and ending at BIkEnd Use these arguments to limit the staircase to a subset of trial specifications within a block F1 F12 These optional arguments can be used to overwrite the default actions of the feedback classes By default only class 2 correct response walks down and all other walk up You may define one of the following actions for each feedback class 1 Walk up 1 Walk down 7 2 4 SETSCASE session comand This command assign
69. the image from the additional screen image into the default IPL page with the masked flag set to On To mask a color picture you must first load it into an additional screen image TRIAL Loadimage LI 1 SP Pic Center LI then load one or more pictures as the mask into the default IPL page to define the transparent areas for the image tranfer process and then transfer the image from the additional screen image into the default IPL page with the masked flag set to On Currently you must trigger the display of the new masked image by using an extra ShowPic command with an empty dummy picture TRIAL Masklmage SP Mask MaskPos amp TIO 11 amp SP EmptyPic Center 1 WK 9 2 External definition file for key names of PC keyboard The table of pre defined ERTS key names has been separated from the ERTS program to allow users to localize key names for different keyboard layouts and to overwrite key names for assigning special screen echo characters to keyboard keys The standard name of the key definition file is ERTS KEY This key must be present in either the ERTS system directory or the current directory To activate other keyboard layouts either overwrite this standard file or add the name of another key definition file to the command line when calling ERTS This file must have the file extension KEY in order to be recognized by ERTS as a key definition file Look in your ERTS system directory for prototypes of keyboard files for different count
70. tures from October 5 2003 Numeric set definition enumerating the boundaries which trigger a response when crossed from center to outside A negative value means that any crossing triggers a response A positive value triggers a response only if the crossing is within a valid sector see angle and tolerance Numeric set definition enumerating the angles that define valid sectors Tolerance defines the size of the valid sectors angle plus minus tolerance A KEY definition that is used as a translation table for the angles List of key names within KEY definition and list of angle in numeric key set must correspond Maximum response time Name of a SET definition consisting of at least on picture which will be used as the joystick cursor Valid picture types are P G R Determines the format of the result file 0 X Y Coordinates default 1 Radius and Angle Determine metric of results for radius 0 Screen coordinates 1 Joystick angle see STICKANGLE 1 20 MJ Measure Joystick This command measure the time of leaving a starting zone and the arrival of one or more target zones The target zones are mapped to key names Syntax MJ StrtRadius TargPos PosNo PosRadius Keys MaxRt Cursor Scale StrtRadius TargPos PosNo PosRadius Key MaxRt Cursor Scale 1 21 WJ Radius which triggers first response Position definitions that define valid target zones Index of position within the position definition which is used as target zone
71. umber of keys to be copied from KeySet Reverse Determines order of copying 0 Normal order default 1 Reverse order 7 New to ERTS V3 26 7 1 General ERTS commands 7 1 1 External index files for controlling trial order The RUNBLOCK command has been extended to support external index files ERTS will execute a block definition according to this external file RUNBLOCK N Valid IndFile Valid N WarmUp IndFile WarmUp RndMode Valid RndMode WarmUp RepMode Valid RepMode WarmUp Instead of defining the number of trials you may refer to an index file This file must list the overall number of trials in the first line The following lines list the indices one per line An index selects the i th trial specification from within a block Page 18 New Features from October 5 2003 7 1 2 Modified SW trial command The SW comand has been extended by the argument CritWord This is the index of the critical word within the picture that is presented in SingleWord Mode With this new argument you may define specific sync triggers and generated responses for the critical word only SW TextPic MaxWords CritWord SWmode SWmask SWtrial VarArgList CritWords Index of critical word If this is gt 0 the behavior of the GR and CE command will be modified 7 1 3 GR Generate Response trial command A new trial command can be used to generate an artifical response synchronuous to the next trial event GR Key Key Name ofa pre defined key that
72. umber will only be generated on machines that have been serialized with this new version of ERTSLIC

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