The first thing most people do with FeatureFinder is setup a profile and add their data files. But, if your files aren’t in the “one-trial-per-file,” text-file format that FeatureFinder expects, you’ll want to do a couple things first: 1) convert your data files to text, and 2) split your data files by trial. This tutorial will show you how to do this—and give you all the code you need! We’ll start by getting your data into text format…

Exporting your data

Your data may already be in text format—i.e., it has a .txt filename and opens in WordPad/TextEdit/etc.—, but if not, there’s almost always an option in your data collection or analysis program to export data to text. Sometimes this will be in the “Save As” window, like with BIOPAC AcqKnowledge, or it could be elsewhere in the program’s menus (e.g., under “Export…”).

If you’re using BIOPAC’s AcqKnowledge program, here’s what to do:

1. Open up your .acq data file in AcqKnowledge
2. Click “Save As” under the “File” menu
3. Select “Text” under the “Save as type” drop-down
4. Click the Options button and ensure the following:
• “Include header” is checked
• “Selected section only” is unchecked
• “Horizontal scale values” is unchecked

Splitting your data

Now that your data file is in text format, we can split it up by trial. We’ll look at two scenarios: trials with equal spacing (say, starting at 5 s, 10 s, 15 s, etc.) and trials with unequal spacing (say: 2, 10, 14, 22, etc.). To make sure we’re on the same page throughout this tutorial, we’re going to use the example files EqualSpacing.txt and UnequalSpacing.txt. Feel free to download them and follow along!

So, just to review, we’re taking a file that has lots of trials:

UnequalSpacing.txt

…and separating the trials into separate files, like this:

...Trial1.txt

...Trial2.txt

...Trial3.txt

...Trial4.txt

...Trial5.txt

Here’s how to do it:

1. Make sure you know i) the sampling rate of your data, ii) the start time of each trial within your data file, and iii) the length of each trial.
• For our example data file, EqualSpacing.txt, the sampling rate is 1000 Hz, the trials start at 2, 8, 14 and 20 s, and they are all 6 s long.
• For UnequalSpacing.txt, the sampling rate is also 1000 Hz, but the trials start at 0, 6, 13, 23, and 29 s. All trials are again 6 s.
2. Download and unzip the MATLAB files SplitData.m and Util_GetFileInfo.m to the same directory as your data file(s).
3. Set MATLAB’s “Current Folder” to the directory containing the downloaded files and your data.
4. In the “Command Window,” type the following command (all on one line):
SplitData('Filename', [T1Start T1Length; T2Start T2Length; etc.], SamplingRate);

replacing the words above with their actual values, and press Enter. Note the single quotation marks around the filename and the semicolons between each pair of trial start/length values.

For EqualSpacing.txt, we’d type the following:

SplitData('EqualSpacing.txt', [2 6; 8 6; 14 6; 20 6], 1000)

For UnequalSpacing.txt, we’d type something similar:

SplitData('UnequalSpacing.txt', [0 6; 6 6; 13 6; 23 6; 29 6], 1000)

And you’re done! Take a look in your data directory and you’ll see all of your new files. If you’ve been following along with the example data, then the new files will have the names Equal_Trial1.txt, Unequal_Trial3.txt, and so on.

If you have any trouble splitting your data, please drop us a note and we’d be happy to offer some advice. And, once your data is in text form and all split up, you’ll be ready to start using FeatureFinder! Check out our written and video tutorials to get started!