[Babase] New kind of Psion sample

Daphne A. Onderdonk babase@www.eco.princeton.edu
Tue, 12 Oct 2004 15:01:43 -0400


Susan Alberts wrote:

> Karl,
>
> We haven't yet told you that we have just introduced a new kind of 
> sample with the psion. This sampling will be of short duration (ie we 
> started it in Sept and should be finished in Oct), but Daphne will 
> have to deal with it soon.
>
> One question that Jeanne and I have not discussed is whether we want 
> these data incorporated into the database. Jeanne, please give your 
> input on this as you will be the primary user of the samples.
>
> I think that we could do it either way -- Daphne could manually pull 
> them all out of the Psion samples before she inputs the Psion points 
> into babase. Or we could ask you to write a conversion program that 
> pulls out this sample type as a separate set of files.

So are these data part of the same Psion files as the regular points 
data, or are they collected as their own separate files?  (Maybe I'm 
just not getting this from your description.)  If they are part of the 
same files, then I guess we need to alter the Uppoints program to put 
these lines somewhere else when the regular points data are updated.  If 
they are separate files, then we can worry about it separately, and 
update the regular points data as we normally do.  I guess either way, I 
think it would be best to use a new/altered updating program rather than 
doing something with it manually (easy for me to say, right, Karl?), in 
part because the header information can easily be separated into various 
columns that way.

> These are not point samples and so they will not fit into the "points" 
> scheme you described in the previous email.
>
> The samples have all the same header information as the current 
> samples, but the sample type is different, "GLA" (for "glance 
> sample"). The samples are collected in order to measure differences 
> among individuals in the rate at which they glance up from their 
> activity (interupt their activity to monitor the environment) and the 
> rate at which they scratch themselves. Both of these things are 
> thought to be measures of "nervousness".
>
> The contents of the sample are single letter entries, either G or S. 
> So a sample looks like this:
>
> Header (all information same as
> G <time>
> S <time>
> G <time>
> G <time>
> G <time>
> G <time>
> G <time>
> S <time>
> S <time>
> G <time>
> G <time>
> End
>
> Thoughts anyone?
>
> Susan