posting

[Brian MacWhinney]

Paul et al.,
     Don't worry, as list maintainer, I have no intention of applying 
any content censorship here.  Your point about free run-time licenses 
or most accessible run-time usage is an interesting one.  PST does have 
site-based run-time licenses for separate sites priced at $100, but I 
am guessing you think that is too high.  Or are you concerned that it 
is clunky in some other way?  When ClassMate becomes available (pretty 
soon, I believe) it will have similar functionality at a reduced price. 
  Perhaps that will address your needs in part. You seem to be pushing 
for "royalty free runtime licensing" but you think that the ability to 
compile executables would be even nicer.   I suppose there are some
technical issues in regard to the latter that make it tough.
    My own point of view on this, as designer and financial supporter of 
first PsyScope and later E-Prime, is that software development is a 
significant expense, particularly in a small niche market such as 
Experimental Psychology.  Having a sophisticated system like E-Prime is 
a positive for the field. Having even more powerful systems (check out 
the list of features for E-Prime 2.0) would be even nicer.  At the same 
time, we always want to make sure that marketing restrictions do not 
impede the advance of research and creativity.
    Regarding ideas such as using MatLab as a replacement for E-Prime, 
and the previous message about just programming stuff in Basic, I guess 
this always depends on the programming skills of the individual, the 
relative simplicity of the experiment, the amount of time one wants to 
invest, and the level of error and other inaccuracies you are willing 
to tolerate.
    In any case, I think it is fine to post discussions of alternatives 
to this list.  If you browse through journals such as BRMIC, you will 
occasionally find discussion of new programming systems and the like 
there too.

--Brian MacWhinney, CMU

On Jan 16, 2005, at 5:47 PM, Paul Gr wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I'm not sure if it appropriate to discuss non-eprime issues in this 
> mailing list, but I think you’re right when you say that deploying or 
> distributing runtime versions of EPrime scripts may be difficult or 
> even impossible. I also realize that software developing companies 
> such as PST require people buying their products to be able to 
> continue their business. I really hope that PST will offer royalty 
> free runtime licences in the near future, so EPrime users are not 
> restricted anymore to run their scripts at their own sites. Or even 
> better: being able to create standalone exe-versions of scripts.
>
> However, beside the licensing strategy, there are also some technical 
> issues that require attention. For instance, the current version of 
> EPrime uses special drivers to handle response devices. These drivers 
> are required for optimal response processing. So, even if there was a 
> possibility to create standalone executables, you would still have to 
> deploy a proper runtime environment. (And don’t forget DirectX…, which 
> is a ‘must have’ for this type of application.)
>
> As far as I know, there are no commercially available alternatives, 
> which don’t have the same deployment issues as EPrime. So, for real 
> standalone executables, you would have to get into  a suitable 
> programming environment and enter the low-level world of WIN32, GDI 
> and DirectX APIs. I know of some projects at other universities, where 
> colleagues are developing their own ‘time critical’ software 
> libraries. However, compared to using EPrime and the like, you really 
> require in-depth expertise and lots of time…
>
> Let’s hope PST (and other’s) come up with a customer-friendly solution 
> for this problem. If not, then I expect some kind of open source 
> project to arise within a year or so.
>
> Best,
> Paul
>
> P.S.: about matlab and alternatives… beside accurate response 
> measurement, you would also require accurate stimulus delivery. Not 
> sure if matlab will pass that test.
>
>
>> From: yoav Bar-Anan <baranan at post.tau.ac.il>
>> To: eprime at mail.talkbank.org
>> Subject: response duration, but not with EPrime
>> Date: Sun, 16 Jan 2005 15:39:05 +0200
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>>
>>
>> I often prefer not to use E-Prime for programming experiments, 
>> because a simple executable written in C++, VB or even HTML, is 
>> easier to deploy. However, when an experiment requires 
>> response-duration recording and accurate timing of events, I always 
>> resort to E-Prime, because I know they invested much effort in 
>> accuracy.
>>
>>
>>
>> I wonder whether anyone can suggest other environments which offer 
>> accurate timing (or tools that can easily produce accurate timing) 
>> that can be ran on most computers without installing anything but the 
>> experiment file.
>>
>>
>>
>> On the same note: What do you think about Matlab as an alternative 
>> for E-Prime?
>>
>>
>>
>> Thank you,
>>
>> Yoav
>
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