CSc 280
User Interfaces

Noldus Observer XT Tutorial
Screen Capture and Keyboard Logging

Introduction

The Laboratory for the Empirical Study of Systems (LESS) has software called Camtasia for doing screen capture, and the Noldus observational software package comes with a module called uLog for doing keyboard logging. This document will explain how to do both. To fully understand this document, you should read our tutorial on camcorders and bullet cams first, since this document assumes that you want to do screen capture and recording from the other cameras at the same time. Be warned: the Noldus software is rickety when it comes to screen capture, so if audio messes up, black screens are showing where there should be video, or other weirdness, don't panic immediately. A restart (of either Noldus or Windows) often sets things straight. Not a positive example of good software design, but oh well.

The Big Picture

Basically, what will be happening is that the observer machine (LESS-01 in the anteroom) will be working with one other computer (LESS-02 in the fishbowl) to do the screen capture. The subject will thus be on LESS-02 for the experiment. The screen capture file will be saved locally to LESS-02 and you'll have to copy and import it. The keyboard logging data will be sent over the network to LESS-01 directly and will be imported into your Noldus project automatically. Any other camera input will go directly to LESS-01 as normal, where you'll have to manually import it into your project. The subject's machine is also connected to a KVM (Keyboard, Video, Mouse) switch that will allow any observer sitting at LESS-01 to see what is happening on the subject's machine in real time. (Well, almost. It's kind of jumpy.)

Before the subject arrives

Here's a step-by-step walkthrough of the setup.
  1. (optional) If you have any team members who plan to be outside the fishbowl during the experiment, you can have that person monitor what is happening on the subject's screen as it happens. After logging into LESS-02 (on the Noldus account), run the VNC viewer from LESS-01 (the icon is on the desktop) and make sure it tries to connect to LESS-02 (The VNC IP # is on a sheet of paper in the anteroom.) Once you see the other screen, move it over to the right hand monitor since you'll need room on the left monitor for Noldus. You can skip this step if no one will be in the anteroom during the experiment.

  2. Log into LESS-01 and LESS-02 if you haven't already (using the Noldus account for both), and then run Noldus on the observer machine. As before, project folders have already been set up for you in the UI Projects Winter 2008 folder.

  3. Start a new observation. By doing so, this will also start the now familiar MPEG-4 recorder control panel that will scan for other recording devices. Make sure the bullet camera on LESS-02 is one of them, and then change where the media files will be stored to your local Media folder in your own project.

  4. When you started a new observation in the previous step, it should also have automatically started Camtasia on the subject's machine. A control panel should pop up on the subject's machine. Minimize (don't kill!) this control panel so it's not in the subject's way. If this control panel doesn't appear, restart Windows on both machines and try again.

  5. On the subject's machine (LESS-02), start the uLog recorder (the icon is on the desktop). Often, this module loses track of the LESS-01 IP address, so if it gives you a "cannot connect" error, just type in the IP address of LESS-01 in the dialogue box that appears, press "Connect", and then press "OK". It should state (on both machines) that uLog is connected.

  6. You're all set for your subject. Make sure cameras are aimed correctly. When you're ready, press the big green button to start recording.

After the subject is done

  1. Before you press the big red button to stop recording, you may want to add an offset calibration to the recording. Just open up a browser (or anything) on the subject's machine and say "NOW!" the moment it appears. You'll use this later because, often, the screen capture is off by a few seconds with respect to the other audio/video recordings, and you'll need to align them back together.

  2. Noldus is a big processor hog when it comes to playback, so after you stop recording, quit everything else except Noldus (including VNC and the MPEG-4 recorder). Too many apps being open is another likely cause of audio/video weirdness.

  3. There is a shortcut on the observer's machine for LESS-02 videos. The screen capture is in there. Find it (by date/time -- it'll be named LESS-02-*) and copy it to your project's Media folder.

  4. Import the media files (including the screen capture) into your project in the normal way (right-click on Media Files in the left Noldus pane and click "Open Media Files"). You'll at least want to import the bullet cam and the screen capture.

  5. You can now playback your observation using the Playback Control. But as mentioned above, the screen capture may be a little "off" with respect to the bullet cam and audio. To fix this, figure out how many seconds you're off (using the "NOW!" calibration you did earlier). Then, click on File Synchronization in the lower-left pane of Noldus. This will bring up a list of media files where you can set one movie's offset to be a certain number of seconds after another.

  6. The keyboard logging will automatically be imported into your project for you. It's in the orange-background window. As your movies play, you'll see this screen scroll as it shows the current keypresses that correspond to what the movie is showing. Finger presses will be recorded as left mouse clicks. There's a lot of data that gets recorded that can help you in your analysis. You'll especially need it to figure out what exactly the user clicked upon the screen.

  7. When done with all subjects for the session, quit uLog and Camtasia on the subject's machine. They're in the minimized tray in the lower-right of Windows, not in the taskbar.

  8. If you wish to code your recordings, you're ready to do that now.

  9. Clean up the lab.

Don't forget to save your project!

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