Payoff Matrix - Feedback Counter (Tidy up script)

[Caleb J. Picker]

David,
Thank you for your amazing advice.  Please see below as I still have
more questions.  Also, if you keep reading past this, I will show you
another solution I came to.  I really really hope that this formatting
thing has been fixed.  I'm so sorry if it hasn't as this is a long
reply and I spent a good 20 minutes trying to make the formatting to
your specifications.

Caleb

On Monday, January 10, 2011 11:32:47 AM UTC-8, dkmcf wrote:
Caleb,
I commend you for taking an interest in improving your code, instead
of simply settling for the first bit of code that gives the appearnce
of working (and which almost always fails on close inspection).  I
hope my comments below don't seem too harsh, if so just consider that
they come from a grouchy old man.

Thank you.  I appreciate constructive criticism.

First, some style issues -- Your code appeared in my e-mail reader
with indentations of *12* spaces!  That is *way* too much
indentation, it makes the code quickly run off the edge of the screen
and makes it unreadable.  Please learn to use the well-documented
industry standard indentation of 4 spaces.  Also, *please* resist the
urge to double-space your code, that only reduces how much of your
code will fit into view on my screen and does nothing to aid
understanding.  I had to take your code into my own text editor and
edit it down to make it readable, do not expect me to do that again.

This only happened because I had copied and pasted my post into Word
in order to save a draft as I was typing so that in case I lost my
post, I could retrieve it.  This may have happened again.  I'm sorry
that Google Groups isn't so friendly with this.

Now, a few comments on the code itself.  First, I wonder if you
really need two different Slide objects?  If they perform essentially
the same function only with different content, then I would just use
one Slide and change the content using attribute references.  That
could simplify the code right there.

I took your advice and basically created script that changed the slide
based upon the Test Type condition.  This necessarily reduced the
amount of code by half (and for your Array example, it decreases the
array by one dimension).

Next, ignoring the MsgBox statements, it seems to me that all that
changes in the various conditions is the number of points by which
AccuracyDisplay changes.  In that case,  I would use a variable to
hold the change amount, e.g., dAccuracyDisplay (i.e., "delta"
AccuracyDisplay), so that the calculation becomes merely

AccuracyDisplay = AccuracyDisplay + dAccuracyDisplay

Yes, you might still need a mess of code to compute dAccuracyDisplay,
but I like to separate the mess that computes dAccuracyDisplay from
the operation that actually uses it, I find such separation aids my
comprehension.

I was not quite sure what you meant by this.  From my understanding, I
would declare a new variable "dAccuracyDisplay".  dAccuracyDisplay
would equal the change in point value between my Payoff conditions.
For example, in Condition "A", let's say that for a Hit, the
participant would receive 1 point and for a Correct rejection, the
participant would receive 5 points.  In Condition "B", Hit = 2 points;
CR = 4 points.  Thus, dAccuracyDisplay = 2-1; 5-4.  The change in
points would thus be 1 between A and B.  This is my actual point
system, by the way.  Hit points increase by 1 each time and CR points
decrease by 1 (from A to E).  In this scenario, I'm not sure how to
implement this variable because it seems unnecessary.

Something like:
************************************************************************************************************
Dim dAccuracyDisplay as Integer ' Represents change in points between
payoff conditions
 Select Case c.getattrib ("Payoff")
    Case "A"
        dAccuracyDisplay=AccuracyDisplay+1
        If c.getattrib("StatusOldNew")="Old" then
            If TestSlideOLDNEW.ACC = 1 then
                AccuracyDisplay=dAccuracyDisplay
.
.
.
    Case "B"
        .
        .
        dAccuracyDisplay=AccuracyDisplay+2
*******************************************************************************
Doesn't doing this defeat the purpose of using a variable in the first
place?

Next, once I have graduated to using a variable (instead of literal
values) in the computation, I would consider using a
multi-dimensional array to hold a table of the possible point values,
and use numeric codes that will act as indices into the table for
each condition.  E.g., I might use 0 instead of "OldNew" for that
TestType, 0 instead of "Old"  for that StatusOldNew, etc.  This
admitedly adds a bit of indirection, but indirection that will could
greatly simplify our computation.  I would of course still need some
code to set up the table at the start of the session, but with that
done my computaton during the run might reduce to a single line, e.g.,

AccuracyDisplay = AccuracyDisplay + PointTable( _
     CInt(c.getattrib ("TestType")), _
     CInt(MasterList.getattrib("StatusOldNew")), TestSlide.ACC )

But I have probably missed something really obvious, so I hope
someone else here will chime in and set me straight.

Okay.  This is where I get really confused.  I understand that a
multidimensional array can hold different values within each dimension
(I did look over the VBA for Dummies Chapter on Arrays and Collections
- Google Books).  If I understand you correctly, you are saying that I
should create such an array with three dimensions.  The first
dimension is my Test Type, the second is StatusOldNew, and the third
is TestSlide.ACC.  I should code each dimension with all of the
possible values as integers.  So for example, for TestType dimension:
1 = "oldnew" and 0 = "PDP".  This coding system can then be called
upon later in the script (like you gave in your example).  I get
confused on how to set this up and implement it, but I think I
understand it conceptually.
 For example (this is what I understand):
**********************************************************************************
dim PointSystem(1,1,1) as variant

'do this for each of the other attributes (e.g. StatusOldNew)
if c.getattrib("TestType") = "OldNew" then
    c.setattrib("TestType"), "0"
Elseif c.getattrib("TestType") = "PDP" then
    c.setattrib("TestType"), "1"
Else
    MsgBox "TestType attribute set error"
End if

'I would set this to the actual and proper point values
PointSystem(0,0 ,0 ) = 1
PointSystem(0 ,1,0 ) = 2
PointSystem( 0,0 ,1) = 3
.
.
.
PointSystem(1,1,1,) = 5

'Then I would use your example and all I would need is this one line.
AccuracyDisplay = AccuracyDisplay + PointSystem( _
     CInt(c.getattrib ("TestType")), _
     CInt(MasterList.getattrib("StatusOldNew")), TestSlide.ACC )
*********************************************************************************

The solution I came to:

I added two attributes to my MasterList List object: Points_HR and
Points_CR.  For each trial, I input the proper point values.  Then,
for my payoff matrix, I simply referenced these point values.

Script:
**************************************************************************
Select Case TestSlideOLDNEW.ACC
	Case "1"
		If c.getattrib("StatusOldNew") = "Old" then
				AccuracyDisplay=AccuracyDisplay+(c.getattrib("Points_HR"))'Hits
		Elseif c.getattrib("StatusOldNew") = "New" then
				AccuracyDisplay=AccuracyDisplay+(c.getattrib("Points_CR"))'Correct
Rejection
		Else MsgBox "Accuracy display case 1 error"
		End if
		c.setattrib "Accuracy", AccuracyDisplay
		Set x =
CSlideText(TestSlideOLDNEW.States(TestSlideOLDNEW.ActiveState).Objects("Text4"))
			If Not x Is Nothing Then
    			x.Text = "Running Total: " & c.getattrib("Accuracy")
			End if
		Debug.Print "Debug Points_HR: " & c.getattrib("Accuracy")
	Case "0"
	   	AccuracyDisplay=AccuracyDisplay
		c.setattrib "Accuracy", AccuracyDisplay
		Set x =
CSlideText(TestSlideOLDNEW.States(TestSlideOLDNEW.ActiveState).Objects("Text4"))
			If Not x Is Nothing Then
    			x.Text = "Running Total: " & c.getattrib("Accuracy")
			End if
		Debug.Print "Debug Incorrect Accuracy: " & c.getattrib("Accuracy")
	Case Else
		MsgBox "TestSlideOLDNEW Accuracy Error"
End Select
***********************************************************************************
Please also note that I am actually not deducting points anymore for
incorrect answers so I do not need a counter for Misses and False
Alarms.

Although this is one solution I reached, I still want to understand
what you meant by your suggestions.  Once again, thank you!

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