Feature Update – *audio, *quit, and better CSVs!

Here’s what’s new:

Add Audio Files

Now you can add mp3 or ogg audio files directly into your programs. Hint: there are some great ogg freebies on Wikimedia Commons.

Add an audio file

Here’s the default way to add a file. Users will see an image like the one above and can click a play button to get your audio started.

Play your audio file automatically

To have your audio file play automatically without the users needing to hit a play button, simply add *start: yes beneath the file. It will start on its own.

Hide your audio file

You might not want your users to see an audio image like the one we showed you above. Simply type *hide: yes to hide your file. The setting shown below will cause the audio file to start playing immediately in the background.

Use the *quit Keyword

Allow the program to end wherever and whenever you like. When inserting the *quit keyword, users won’t be able to see any line of text or keyword that may follow it.

The *quit keyword may be especially useful in multiple choice options, where one option causes the program to end and the other allows it to continue.

Add text *before and *after a question box

Now you can add text immediately before and immediately after the box in which users can write an answer to a question. It looks like this:

These keywords are easy to add.

They also work with any other question add-ons. So, if you’d like users to enter a number, but want to provide a dollar sign for them, simply enter something like the following:

Similarly, to enter a % sign try the following:

See a chart showing answers to a question

When viewing all answers given for a question, you’ll now be able to see a bar chart of how that question has been answered by your users.

Here’s a sample of what it looks like.

As you can see, five people answered that there favorite color was “fuzzy wuzzy brown,” which was about 45% of the total answers.

Here’s how to find the charts.

  • Go to the Data screen of your program.
  • Click the Questions tab.
  • Select a question of interest to you.
  • Marvel at the chart.

Voila! You can see a fancy pants graph (soon to be fancier) showing you the percentage and number of times an answer was given.

Tip: You can also access this by clicking “Answers” for any user’s run and selecting a question of interest from there.

This chart will show for all types of questions, including multiple choice, text, and paragraph. However, if there are more than 15 unique answers (which may be especially likely in a text or paragraph question) then the chart will not appear, (at least, not yet).

See the Last Place of a Run in the “Position” Column of a CSV

You’ll now be able to tell how far along a user has gotten in their run by looking at the CSV file. Check out the column “Position.” It will show a unique code (aka “node”) that represents the text or keyword that was at the top of the last visited screen.

Tech jargon: Nodes are unique identifiers, made up of a 7-character string of numbers and letters. Each line of text, keyword, question and answer pair, etc. will have a unique node.

See the Final Value of Variables in the CSV

Your program may use variables with the save keyword, the set keyword, or with the option to save variables using >>. The value of these variables may be different for different runs or at different points in a run. You’ll be able to see the final value of a variable in the CSV of your data.

In our example above, you can see that 2 variables were part of our program, “Name” and “Likes_Sugar.” Here’s a peak at the program that produced these variables:

The variable “Name” was created using the *save keyword.  In our case, we asked users their name and saved their response by typing *save: Name. Variables saved using the >> function will look similar in a CSV.

The variable “Likes_Sugar” was created using a *set keyword. When a *set is triggered during a run it will produce the value “TRUE” in the CSV. As you can see, in 3 of the 4 runs users set off the variable “Likes_Sugar” by selecting “Yes” when asked if they like sugar.