Xref: utzoo comp.sys.mac.hypercard:1335 comp.sys.mac.programmer:3450
Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!unmvax!pprg.unm.edu!hc!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!hoptoad!tim
From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.hypercard,comp.sys.mac.programmer
Subject: Re: Reaction Time stacks : can I do this?
Message-ID: <6015@hoptoad.uucp>
Date: 8 Dec 88 00:05:44 GMT
References: <6012@mva.cs.liv.ac.uk> <21792@apple.Apple.COM> <294@internal.Apple.COM> <21826@apple.Apple.COM>
Reply-To: tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney)
Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco
Lines: 24

These were not particularly helpful replies.  It seems one can indeed
do such a stack in HyperCard, but it would be more difficult than
writing an application to do the same thing.  The entire process has to
be done within an XCMD.  Consider the elements of a reaction time
test.  First you have to show something meant to cause a reaction; then
you have to determine when the reaction was given.

You can't do the display portion in a card -- the graphics tools and
commands to manipulate them may run at any speed.  You can't do the
reaction sensing using HyperCard's mouse or keyboard handling --
there's no way to tell when the reaction happened.  You can't draw
right into a card yourself -- the results are undefined.  So the XCMD
has to bring up a window, draw the whatever with QuickDraw, and then
monitor the mouse and keyboard watching for the reaction.  Where does
HyperCard come into it?  You have a button to give the XCMD and start
the test, and the results are written into a field or text file
somewhere.  These two things are just as easy to accomplish in an
application.

Applications are easier to write than XCMDs, so all in all it seems
you've lost a great deal by using HyperCard for such a thing.
-- 
Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
"Jesus died for somebody's sins, but not mine." -- Patti Smith