Overview
Expyriment is an open-source and platform independent light-weight Python
library for designing and conducting timing-critical behavioural and
neuroimaging experiments. The major goal is to provide a well-structured Python
library for a script-based experiment development with a high priority on the
readability of the resulting programme code. It has been tested extensively
under Linux and Windows.
Expyriment is an all-in-one solution, as it handles the stimulus
presentation, recording of I/O events, communication with other devices and the
collection and preprocessing of data. It offers furthermore a hierarchical
design structure, which allows an intuitive transition from the experimental
design to a running programme. It is therefore also suited for students as well
as experimental psychologists and neuroscientists with little programming
experience.
Website: http://www.expyriment.org
Authors
Main features
- Easy syntax, very readable (due to Python)
- Cross-platform (Linux, Windows, OS X)
- Allows for fast and efficient programming of experiments (do more with less
code)
- A variety of standard stimuli (Text, Picture, Audio, Video etc.)
- Keyboard, Mouse, Serial Port, Parallel Port and Gamepad support
- Hierarchical structure of experimental units (Experiment, Blocks, Trials, Stimuli)
For a full documentation of all Expyriment functionality (i.e. all available
modules, classes, methods, functions, constants, and attributes provided by the
Expyriment Python package), please have a look at the API reference pages
Example code
Creating experiments, blocks, trials and stimuli:
exp = expyriment.design.Experiment()
block = expyriment.design.Block()
trial = expyriment.design.Trial()
stimulus = expyriment.stimuli.TextLine(text="Hello World")
Building a hierarchy between various structures:
trial.add_stimulus(stimulus)
block.add_trial(trial)
exp.add_block(block)
Presenting stimuli:
for block in exp.blocks:
for trial in block.trials:
trial.stimuli[0].present()
Handling input devices:
button, rt = exp.keyboard.wait([expyriment.misc.constants.K_SPACE])
Logging data:
exp.data.add([button, rt])
Licence
Expyriment is free software and released under the Open Source GNU General
Public Licence of the Free Software
Foundation.
Development repository
The Expyriment development repository is currently hosted on
Google Code. Get a local copy of this repository with this command:
hg clone https://code.google.com/p/expyriment/
Mailing lists
Expyriment newletter: All users of Expyriment should subscribe to the
Expyriment newsletter, since the project is still under development. All
modifications and new versions will be announce via this mailing list. (visit
website or send an email
to expyriment+subscribe@googlegroups.com)
Expyriment users mailing list: If you have questions regarding the
installation, usage or documentation of Expyriment please don’t hesitate to
contact the Expyriment users mailing list (visit website or send an email to
expyriment-users+subscribe@googlegroups.com) or contact us directly by sending
an email to info@expyriment.org.
Suggestions and bug tracking
If you want to make suggestions to improve Expyriment or you found a bug,
please post your comments to the Expyriment issues page or contact us directly by
sending an email to info@expyriment.org.
