Search modes in the Find/Replace interface In the Find (Ctrl+F) and Replace (Ctrl+H) dialogs, the three available search modes are specified in the bottom right corner. To use a search mode, click on the radio button before clicking the Find Next or Replace buttons. Cleaning up a DMDX .zil file DMDX allows you to run experiments where the user responds by using the mouse or some other input device. Depending on the number of choices/responses (and of course the kind of task), DMDX will output a .zil file containing the results (instead of the traditional .azk file). This is specified in the header along with the various response options available to the participant. For some reason, DMDX outputs the reaction time twice—and on separate lines—in .zil files. Here's a guide for cleaning up these messy .zil files with Notepad++. Explanations of the Notepad++ search terms are provided in bullet points at the end of each step. Step 1: Backup your original result file (e.g. yourexperiment.zil) and create a copy of that file (yourexperiment_copy.zil) that we will edit and clean up. Step 2: Open yourexperiment_copy.zil in Notepad++ (version 4.9 or later).
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Search modes in the Find/Replace interface
In the Find (Ctrl+F) and Replace (Ctrl+H) dialogs, the three available search modes are specified in the bottom right corner. To use a search mode, click on the radio button before clicking the Find Next or Replace buttons.
Cleaning up a DMDX .zil file
DMDX allows you to run experiments where the user responds by using the mouse or some other input device. Depending on the number of choices/responses (and of course the kind of task), DMDX will output a .zil file containing the results (instead of the traditional .azk file). This is specified in the header along with the various response options available to the participant. For some reason, DMDX outputs the reaction time twice—and on separate lines—in .zil files. Here's a guide for cleaning up these messy .zil files with Notepad++. Explanations of the Notepad++ search terms are provided in bullet points at the end of each step.
Step 1: Backup your original result file (e.g. yourexperiment.zil) and create a copy of that file (yourexperiment_copy.zil) that we will edit and clean up.
Step 2: Open yourexperiment_copy.zil in Notepad++ (version 4.9 or later).
.* selects the text after the + up until the word "Item".
Item finds the string "Item".
() allow us to access whatever is inside the parentheses. The first set of parentheses may be accessed with \1 and the second set with \2.
\1\r\n\2 will take + and whatever text comes after it, will then add a new line, and place the string "Item" on the new line.
So far so good. Our aim now is to delete duplicate or redundant information (reaction time data).
Step 6: Remove all newline characters using Extended search mode, replacing them with a unique string of text that we will use as a signpost for redundant data later in RegEx. Choose a string of text that does not appear in you .zil file—I have chosen mork.
Switch to Extended search mode in the Replace dialog.
Find what: \r\n
Replace with: mork
Press Replace All. All the newline characters are gone. Your entire DMDX .zil file is now one very long line of (in my case word-wrapped) text.
[^...] is the inverse. So, if we put these three together: [^A-Za-z] finds any characterexcept an alphabetic character.
Notice that only one of the [^A-Za-z] is in parentheses (). This is recalled by \1 in the Replace with field. The characters outside of the parentheses are discarded.
Step 10: Let's get rid of all those morks.
Find what: mork
Replace with: (leave blank)
Press Replace All. The morks are gone.
Step 11: Separate each participant's data from the next.
Find what: (\**\*)
Replace with: \r\n\r\n\1\r\n\r\n
Press Replace All. The final product is a beautiful, comma-delimited .zil result file that is ready to be imported into Excel for further analysis.
Please post your questions in the comments below, rather than emailing me. This way, others can refer to my answers here, saving me many hours of responding to similar emails over and over.
Update 20/2/2009: Having trouble understanding regexp? I have created a new Guide for regular expressions. Check it out.