MindWare Event files are stored in tab-delimited column format, where each row represents a new event and each column stores specific information about that event. There are two types of MindWare Event files named for the type of timestamp used to describe the location of each event – Absolute and Relative.

Note: Relative Time event files are only supported by analysis applications version 3.2 and greater.

Absolute Time

Absolute Time event files are the style of event file written by BioLab 3.0 and earlier. There are 4 columns of information:

• Event Type – A string describing the source of the event. This is one of the two fields which can represent the event during analysis. Some examples of event types include:

Digital I/O Line 2

Keyboard : F2

• Name – A string describing what the event means. This is the second field which can be used to represent the event during analysis. Some examples of names include:

Cough

Subject 1 leaves room

Baseline Start

• Date – The date on which the event occurred. The format of this date is MM/DD/YYYY where
  • MM is the 2 digit month
  • DD is the 2 digit day
  • YYYY is the 4 digit year
  • These fields are separated by the forward slash “/” character
• Time – The exact time at which the event occurred. The time stamp is specifiable down to the millisecond with the format HH:MM:SS.fff AM/PM where
  • HH is the 2 digit hours
  • MM is the 2 digit minutes
  • SS is the 2 digit seconds
  • fff is the 3 digit fractional seconds
  • AM/PM (choose one) specifies whether the event occurs before or after noon
  • These fields are separated by the colon “:” character with the exception of AM/PM, which is preceded by a space

A value must be present for all of these columns for each event specified.

The first 2 rows of a MindWare event file must contain specific values for these columns:

1. Header – This row contains the labels for each of the columns specified above
2. Start Event – This event must correspond with the start of the data file, as it is the event from which all subsequent events will calculate their relative offset from the beginning of the data file

Relative Time

There are 3 columns of information in a Relative Time event file:

• Event Type – A string describing the source of the event. This is one of the two fields which can represent the event during analysis. Some examples of event types include:

Digital I/O Line 2

Keyboard : F2

• Name – A string describing what the event means. This is the second field which can be used to represent the event during analysis. Some examples of names include:

Cough

Subject 1 leaves room

Baseline Start

• Time – The time in fractional seconds (i.e. 2.125) from the start of the data file at which the event occurred

See this article for instructions on how to manually create event files using Excel.