New Blog 1: Learn Python The Hard Way

Tuesday, 30 October 2012

Learn Python The Hard Way

I have a pretty specific goal in mind, I'm looking to work my way up to programming a psychology experiment that presents participants with pairs of word or picture stimuli and record their key-press response times. We have a VB6 app that we use for this already (you can download a copy of it at IRAP 2012 Program update if you were interested for some reason) but the code is a mess. It needs to be redone from the ground up and in something that we can a) deploy one multiple operating systems, and b) distribute as a single executable with no or minimal dependancies so that other researchers can pick it up and use it with little setup time. I asked around and was pointed towards Python. I've looked at packages like PsychoPy to make my job easier, but they don't give adequate control over randomisation, looping, or data output. I'm now considering using wxpython or Python Card (I was initially a little stumped as to how to create a GUI - shows my lack of knowledge!).