OpenSesame help

This is the offline help page. If you are connected to the internet, you can browse the online documentation by clicking here.

Introduction

OpenSesame is a graphical experiment builder for the social sciences. It allows you to easily create experiments, using a point-and-click graphical interface. For complex tasks, OpenSesame supports Python scripting.

Getting started

The best way to get started is to follow the tutorial and/ or take a look at example experiments. This, and much more, can be found online in the OpenSesame documentation area.

Interface

The graphical interface consists of the following parts. You can get context sensitive help by clicking on the help icons at the top-right of each tab.

Items

Items are the building blocks of your experiment. There are 10 core items that provide the basic functionality that is necessary to create an experiment. Core items can be dragged into to your experiment from the item toolbar.

If installed, plug-in items provide additional functionality. Plug-ins appear alongside the core items in the item toolbar. An overview of available plug-ins can be found online.

Running your experiment

You can run your experiment in full-screen mode (Control+R; Run -> Run fullscreen) or in a window (Control+W; Run -> Run in window). When the 'auto-response' option (Run -> Enable auto-response) is enabled, OpenSesame will simulate keypress and mouseclick responses, which can be useful when testing your experiment.

Saving your experiment

Experiments can be saved in two file formats: