Home Page:  Home Page: www.SIMS2000.com

 

 

 

Updated:  January 2012

SIMS 2000 - Version 6 - Sensory Information Management System

 

Enhancements and Updates Listing - Readme

Notes:

·         This list is intended to inform you about many of the enhancements and changes to SIMS 2000

·         Within each version of SIMS 2000, we release frequent ‘build dates’. You can see your exact SIMS 2000 build date on main menu screen.

·         Getting the newest release is easy, see menu option under Administration/Check for SIMS 2000 Updates.

·         Newest update of this list is always available at:  SIMS 2000 Support Web Page

·         We are continually enhancing the SIMS 2000 sensory system software.  We invite you to call us with your custom requirements.

 

 

            Recent Major Enhancements:

 

Test presentation:

·       TDS Temporal Dominance of Sensations.

·       Randomization of attribute presentation order on screen.

·       Randomization of images and photos on screen.

·       Triangle tests multiple replications affective discrimination.

·       Apple iPad compatibility.

 

Reporting:

·       Penalty analysis, tables and excel graphs.

·       Comment coding, reports and analysis.

·       Immediate Individual Panelist Feedback, Panelist Performance.

·       Statistics, SAS, JMP, SPSS.

 

Data management:

·       Continuous time intensity advanced technician data point editing.

·       Free database Microsoft SQL 2008 express optional installation.

 

Online testing:

·       SensoryTest.com, internet sensory testing

·       SIMS 2000 Express Packages

 

Version 6                                                     (listed by most recent enhancements)

Report Panelist Feedback, technician report with optional Standard Means And Standard Deviations.   (Jan 2011)

Panelist Master Activity Reports, new column for Days Participated.   (Dec 2011)

Questionnaires,  Discrimination PC & PCN together on a ballot.   (Dec 2011)

TDS Temporal Dominance of Sensations.  (November 2011)

               Click here to see :  SIMS 2000 TDS Temporal Dominance of Sensations

Questionnaire Hedonic & ATA choices, new tag <br> to allow for multi-line choices, ala conjoint.  (Oct 2011)

Anonymous Panelists, improved resignin flexibility after each sample at different booths/locations.  (Sep 2011)

Paired Comparison Attribute Analysis reporting, more options, incomplete block, etc.  (Aug 2011)

Blinding codes assignments, more custom control of over reps, paired comparisons.  (Aug 2011)

SIMS 2000 Express Packages, copy and transfer entire tests to & from remote systems and PCs.  (July 2011)

Branching, add ability to branch based on Paired Comparisons & Discrimination responses.  (July 2011)

Data subsetting, add ability to subset based on Paired Comparisons & Discrimination responses.  (July 2011)

Testing, new option Maximum Allowed Relative Sample #, control how far your panel can proceed.  (June 2011)

Time Intensity Continuous, new option to show live real time graph during preview or live test.    (May 2011)

Reports, incomplete block paired comparisons, frequency counts, notes & head-to-head grid results.  (May 2011)

Test execution multiple rep tests, always [Start] test at rep=1 when allow continuous over reps.  (May 2011)

Branching and logical skip patterns, general usage improvements.  (Apr 2011)

Randomization of Attribute presentation order on screen.  (Mar 2011)

Randomization of Images and Photos on screen.  (Feb 2011)

Triangle Tests, support for multiple replications Affective Discrimination.  (Feb 2011)

Edit Raw Test Data screens, more filter options for current data list view.  (Feb 2011)

Profiling Ballot Testing, add support for Yes/No attribute types, and miscellaneous improvements.  (Jan 2011)

Continuous Time Intensity, add functionality for advanced technician data editing.  (Jan 2011)

Branching skip patterns on All That Apply attributes improved options.  (Jan 2011)

Comment Coding reports new options for Comments seen only once, i.e. demographic comments (Jan 2011)

Grouped Intensity, new option to randomize the order of attributes presented.  (Nov 2010)

SIMS 2000 DVD includes free SQL 2008 R2 Express Editions 32-bit and 64-bit, optional installation. (Oct 2010)

Panelist master field lengths increased, first name, last name, panelist notes, etc. (Oct 2010)

Use phrase Ballot Number instead of Sample Set for Panelists in various locations. (Sep 2010)

General improvements to optional Sample Set and Sample Number verification messages to panelist. (Sep 2010)

Grouped Intensity, new null ability to allow skipping responses, and access via multiple text editing. (Aug 2010)

Polling Screens, new Favorites option, save / recall favorites.  (Aug 2010)

Experimental Plans, Position Counts, Crossover Counts, more randomization options.  (July 2010)

Latin Squares Williams Designs, automatic Experimental Plans configuration, samples 2 to 26  (June 2010)

Questionnaire Branching, new ability to base on demographics questions seen previous samples. (May 2010)

Questionnaire new Tags for Relative & Absolute Sample # Blinding Codes and Sample Descriptions. (May 2010)

Result Summary Statistics, graphs, add optional and manual Y scale minimum & maximum   (Apr 2010)

Test result, new advanced ability to delete samples, absolute or relative, from test data for reporting (Mar 2010)

Questionnaire Editing,  new alignment option for Details Top Margins Alignment.   (Jan 2010)

Questionnaire Branching, new ability to Branch Skip Pattern based All That Apply sub choices.   (Dec 2009)

Spellcheck Questionnaire, add support for including Hedonic & All That Apply sub choices.  (Dec 2009)

Reports, Panelist In Columns Report, new ability to include all Reps on same report. (Nov 2009)

Questionnaire Editing, new ability to easily move/change sequence, of ballot attributes/rows. (Oct 2009)

Questionnaire Branching, Technician editing screens, various visual and functional enhancements. (Oct 2009)

Reports, Enhanced Frequency reports for Hedonics, now include rows when choice frequency is 0. (Sep 2009)

Reports, New report, Multiple Test Result Raw Data Report.  (Aug 2009)

Result Summery Stats Report, new option for Combination of multiple tests data.  (Aug 2009)

Statistics, mean separations, new option Column Designations Format Market Research.  (July 2009)

Internet, Panelist Testing, support for more browsers, MSIE, Firefox, Mozilla, Safari, Opera, etc.  (June 2009)

Report Top/Bottom/Middle Boxes, new ability to run Multiple Reports at once, stack'em.  (June 2009)

Test Polling screen, improve information when force sample set selection, before ballot # entry (June 2009)

Statistics, new SAS GLM option for Order Term Effect as an additional independent variable.  (May 2009)

Anonymous Panelist resignin now possible in certain situations.  (May 2009)

Technician screens, new automatic height adjustments better visual for today’s high res monitors.  (May 2009)

Report Panelist Feedback, new technician options for subsets of Attributes.  (May 2009)

Top/Bottom Reports and Analysis, new options for Top 1, Bottom 1, and Middle 1 box.  (May 2009)

New test Startup Parameter,  optionally skip the automatic showing of the Polling Screen.  (May 2009)

Graphics and Charts, Standard Deviations and Confidence Intervals features and bars. (April 2009)

New Report, Attribute Export Labels List Reports, system-wide ballot counts, summaries, data, etc. (Mar 2009)

New Report, Sample Descriptions List Report, system-wide design counts, summaries, data, etc. (Mar 2009)

Free-Choice Profiling, panelist’s comment text entry becomes line scale attribute. (March 2009)

Paired Comparison Attribute Analysis, support for Combining multiple Paired Comparison Tests  (March 2009)

Graphics & Charts, Custom Favorites for Y Scale settings.  (March 2009)

New Panelist Comparison Report, Panelist In Columns Report.  Good for Panelist Training. (February 2009)

Statistics, added Confidence Interval (CI) to various reports such as Result Summary Stats  (February 2009)

Any Panelist can now participate in many tests simultaneously, especially Generic Panelists (January 2009)

Questionnaire Comment Questions, more options, more control, better layouts.  (December 2008)

Reports, various improvements, new options, new columns.  Too many to list.  (December 2008)

Questionnaire Multiple Text Edit Anytime, more options, wider layout.  Hedonics/ATAs/Comments.  (Nov 2008)

Questionnaires, all Attributes, TAGing question text support, formally just Instruction boxes.  (October 2008)

Quick Code Search added to Test Definitions, Experimental Designs, and Panel Group forms. (October 2008)

Panelist Self Administration improvements, especially larger client sites multiple groups. (October 2008)

Questionnaires, Attributes Text, new visual Alignment options all question types.  (September 2008)

Experimental Designs, Sample Descriptions new import/export functionality.  (September 2008)

Questionnaires, enhanced All That Apply question types, new Matrix columns layout styles, minimum and maximums optional rules, randomizations, and margins and widths controls.  (August 2008)

Test Result Status, new column data for every panelist ‘Most Recent Response Date/Time’.  (July 2008)

Administrator Deleting Panelists from *Active and Executing* Tests is now possible.  (June 2008)

Report, Quick Summary of all Test Result Codes, new expanded searches by description & notes.(June 2008)

Questionnaires Master Notes, new feature for Multiple Notes Editing.  (June 2008)

LIMS Batch Testing, Automated Test Creation, Execution, Linking.  (May 2008)

Sample Ranking, new support for incomplete block experimental designs. (Mar 2008)

SIMS 2000 application folder/directory new default of C:\Program Files\SIMS2000\   (Mar 2008)

Statistical Analysis, large studies, speed improvements report preparation. (Feb 2008)

Large Ballots, improved speed performance while editing questionnaire, and report statistics. (Feb 2008)

Sample Profiling, popup one attribute for multiple samples simultaneously. (Jan 2008)

Panelist Testing, All That Apply Attributes, new Randomization of choices order on screen. (Dec 2007)

Raw Data Export Reports, new Option for exporting Hedonic Captions instead of the real data. (Dec 2007)

Comment Report, new options for Response Column population, use nearest previous/next Attribute.

Ranking, new option to swap in Sample Descriptions User Sees instead of Blinding Codes. (Dec 2007)

Windows Vista, better detection of Versions, better multimedia video movie support in ballots. (Dec 2007)

Test Definition, Allow for changes to Questionnaire Code, Only if No Data exists the Test. (Nov 2007)

Penalty Analysis Reporting, Tables and Excel Graphs. (Nov 2007)

Test Definition, Allow for changes to Questionnaire Code, Only if No Data exists the Test . (Oct 2007)

Frequency Reports, major rewrite, better speed, more options, Excel & Word exports, etc. (Sep 2007)

Panelist Testing, new <BEEP> tag for Instruction Boxes, such as following a Time Delay screen. (Aug 2007)

Stats, Incomplete Block, one sample presented, One Way Model, leading to Mean Separations. (Aug 2007)

Test Activity Polling screen, new option for Reducing Panel Flickering. (Aug 2007)

Graphs, new options for order of the graph elements, Attributes/Samples Move Up/Down. (Aug 2007)

Questionnaire Branching/Skip patterns added conditional relative/absolute sample options. (July 2007)

New Result Summary Statistics Report, includes N, Mean, Min, Max, Std.Dev., Std.Err.  (June 2007)

Test Linking, new site-wide option Bypass and Skip the Test Link pass thru message.  (June 2007)

Microsoft Word 2007, report exporting format improvements.  (June 2007)

Questionnaire editing, New easier Printing Ballots WYSIWYG.  (May 2007)

MS Word 2007 report exporting format improvements.  (May 2007)

Test Polling Screen, new ability to display Absolute Sample number without Blinding Code.  (Apr 2007)

Raw Data Export, BIG Ballots, new Column Options to select Attribute Type subsets.  (Apr 2007)

SIMS 2000 Online Instructional Training Videos, New option under Main Menu + Help.  (Mar 2007)

Ranking Reports, added Attribute Means and Graphs via Frequency Report forms.  (Mar 2007)

New Comment WORD Frequency Report  (Mar 2007)

Questionnaire Editing, quick search lookups, new Instruction Box Tags, new Branch options.  (Mar 2007)

Deleting Panelists from tests, new ability to select multiple panelists for deletion.  (Mar 2007)

Report T2/B2 T3/B3 Added new statistics option for ‘One-Way Model’, best for nC1 studies.  (Feb 2007)

Most Excel Export Reports, better use of ‘Freeze’ header rows for easier visual scrolling.  (Feb 2007)

Questionnaire Editing,  new Anytime Multiple Question/Instruction Text Editing. (Jan 2007)

Questionnaire Editing,  new Multiple Add/Edit import Hedonics or All That Apply. (Jan 2007)

Panelist Custom Fields, New All That Apply and Branching Logic, improved ease of use. (Jan 2007)

Test Definition Screens.  Improved ease of use, auto selections, speed, etc. (Dec 2006)

Questionnaires,  New Instruction Box Tag for showing Sample Descriptions in Questionnaires. (Dec 2006)

Questionnaires,  New Panelist feedback for Same/Different Test.  See Forum Notes. (Dec 2006)

Stacking Multiple Horizontal Hedonic Attribute Questions. (Oct 2006)

                            Click here to see :  SIMS 2000 Multiple Horizontal Hedonic Attributes

Statistical Analysis, combining multiple tests, more flexible use of ‘Highly Similar’ Questionnaire. (Oct 2006)

New Report, Multiple Result Means Report. (Oct 2006)

New Panelist Testing option for Disable the Comment Popup Keypad usage In All Questionnaires. (Oct 2006)

New Statistical Analysis option to 'Drop all Demographic questions/attributes’ from Analysis. (Sept 2006)

Windows Domain Authentication, optional authentication for Technicians and/or Panelists.  (Sept 2006)

Quick Summary of all Test Result Codes Report, New option for Text Search Filter.   (Sept 2006)

Project Status Report, enhanced, new options, faster.   (August 2006)

Test Definition Rotation Plans, New Excel Exporting of Rotation Plan Sample Sets.   (August 2006)

SensoryTest.com, Internet Sensory Testing.  (July 2006)

Hide/Unhide Management, New Buttons on key Forms, trying to get more clients using concept.  (July 2006)

Polling Screen Wait Times, add better support for Anonymous Panelists. (July 2006)

Multimedia MPG Movies in Questionnaire, fix AutoPlay which is suddenly an issue with XP SP2.   (July 2006)

Updated enhanced main menu, new clickable hot spots on system flowchart’s 8 boxes.   (June 2006)

Profile Tests with multiple reps, added new functionality to allow continuous presentation reps.   (June 2006)

Test Data Frequency Reports, speed improvement, better stops, more progress indicators.   (May 2006)

Test Definition Rotation Plans, new option to include Block Analysis from View.   (May 2006)

Multiple Test Linking, better dynamic detection for panelists of creation of technician Test Links.  (May 2006)

Graphics, fix rare error when changing Attribute or Sample labels, only when subset of graph.  (May 2006)

Test Polling screens, new option to append Absolute Sample Number with Blinding Codes.  (April 2006)

Graphics and Charts, enhanced convenience of Y-Axis Scale options, Min, Max, Divisions.  (April 2006)

Questionnaire All that Apply questions, increased width of allowed choices and Fonts.  (April 2006)

Panelist Credit Reports & Editing, new filter options for specific Technician User IDs / Results. (March 2006)

Questionnaire Editing for Line Scales, Reference Point Captions Global Replace. (March 2006)

Statistics, updated helpful ‘Notes’ in many stats areas, t-tests, chi-squares, discrimination, etc. (Feb 2006)

Statistics, Top 3 / Bottom 3 Box Analysis functionality added to existing T2/B2 (Dec 2005)

Questionnaires, All That Apply Questions, when many listed, new Automatic column creation logic (Dec 2005)

Full Support for Microsoft SQL Server 2005 (Dec 2005)

              Including the free, easy-to-use, lightweight SQL 2005 Express Edition.

SIMS 2000 Version 6 Released (Dec 2005)

 

Version 3.3

 

Statistics, Combine Tests, more options, speed improvements (Nov 2005)

Panelist Comparison Reports, speed improvements, especially for big studies (Nov 2005)

Test Execution Test Linking enhanced, now allows for pre-existing Test Data in either Test (Oct 2005)

Test Sensitivity Analyzer, added to Main Reports, Discrimination Reports (Oct 2005)

Test Execution, Panelist Discrimination Feedback Message Screen, visual enhancements (Oct 2005)

Added JMP Advanced Analysis Reporting to Table Generation (Sep 2005)

Sample Blinding Codes, Randomization, added avoidance of repeated hundredth’s place (Sep 2005)

Graphics and Charts, new Chart type, Hi-Lo-Mean. (Aug 2005)

CrossTabs/SubGroups, export to Excel, changed Hedonic Sort order to match questionnaire display order.

Avery Labels, added ability for technician to specify REFerence Label text other than 'REF'. (Aug 2005)

Questionnaire Editing, automatic recall of user favorite Font for new Attributes instruction text. (Aug 2005)

Frequency Report Tabled Format, added optional Percentages to be included. (Aug 2005)

Frequency Report Tabled Format, added new column for ALL samples when Attribute is seen Relative.

Panelist Comparison Report, Attribute Columns Sample, Excel Export Formatting enhancements  (Aug 2005)

Questionnaire, Line Scale Reference Points, many Technician Editing User enhancements. (July 2005)

Questionnaire Editing, Properties, New Full Screen Toggle functionality.  Wheel Mouse support. (July 2005)

Panelist Feedback Reports, added new rows/cells for (N) Observations. (July 2005)

Raw Data Export, Anonymous panelist rows now appear better alpha sort order, Anonymous[nnn] (July 2005)

Statistics, New Sensory Test Raw Data Exporting to JMP (SAS) Statistics, along with existing software data export support for SAS, SPSS, JMP Statgraphics, Microsoft Excel, Camo Unscrambler, etc.  (May 2005)

Statistics, SIMS 2000 Advanced Analysis via SAS, significant speed improvement.  (May 2005)

Questionnaire Editing, Affective Discrimination, improved flexibility for Discrimination Attributes.  (May 2005)

Statistics, New Anova Analysis Top Line Table using Only Microsoft Excel Functions.  (April 2005)

All Editing/Reporting Forms and Grids, better multiple keypress instant search and find.  (April 2005)

Panelist Signin, new Timer (1 minute) Checks for Test Ended/Cancelled, then Auto Loop back to Waiting for a test to Begin.  (April 2005)

Questionnaire Editing, Time Delay/Intensity, new optional image file for display during the delay countdown.  (April 2005)

Data SubSet Creation from existing Result Master Test Data, use throughout SIMS2000 system  (April 2005)

Test Polling Screen, new option to display Panelist Name in addition to existing Panelist Code  (April 2005)

Continuous Time Intensity, Add Raw Data Export to Excel for Entire Data Sets  (April 2005)

Discrimination Performance Reports, Speed Improvements and Detail Reports to Excel Export  (April 2005)

Statistics, New Sensory Test Raw Data Exporting to Statsoft Statistica, along with existing software data export support for SAS, SPSS, Statgraphics, Microsoft Excel, CAMO Unscrambler, etc.  (March 2005)

New SIMS 2000 Attribute Type: Grouped Intensity.  Grouped Intensity Attributes allows you to group many attributes together on the panelists questionnaire.  Many Intensity questions can now be presented within a PC monitor screen than ever before.   This was a BIG enhancement to SIMS2000.   (January 2005)

                                                                    Click here to see :  SIMS 2000 Grouped Intensity Attributes

Test Data Result Master Screen, new button showing all Test components for current Result’s Test Definition.

Questionnaire Editing,  better movable choices for Hedonic and Multimedia, and All That Apply.  (Jan 2005)

Line Scales, better looking Add defaults, better save favorite, new load SCS default.  (Nov 2004)

Panelist Master Reports, full Excel exporting now available, including all custom criteria.  (Nov 2004)

Panelist Master Reports, new button to quickly select Panelists from any desired SIMS 2000 test.  (Nov 2004)

Additional Helpful Test information in various window’s blue title bar (Oct 2004)

Graphics, new option to Average the Means for Demographic Attributes, available from Graphics Icon/Menu, selecting Test Data Result Codes. (Oct 2004)

Panelist Reports, new search Custom Criteria, search strings thru Panelist Notes.  (Oct 2004)

Test start parameters new option “Reset Sample # with each Rep.  Only shows when Allowing Continuous Presentation Over Reps. (Sept 2004)

Test start parameters new option “Allow Panelists to Perform Panelist Self-Administration, new button on Panelist Sign in Screen. (Sept 2004)

New Frequency Report, Under Hedonics Only, Customized Grouping Analysis With Label Options.(Sept 2004)

AnyRoom Testing, new site-wide option, Panelist Sign in Screens, Show Only Test Descriptions on AnyRoom Testing Selection Screen   (Sept 2004)

VB Enterprise Studio 6, Service Pack 6, Microsoft released March 2004.   (Sept 2004)

New additional 3rd last chance Warning, Test Integrity, when deleting or modifying Test Components.  New big display on this final warning.  Trying to avoid accidental test data deletion.  (Sept 2004)

New Screens for Test Component Management, Hide and Unhide Management.  (August 2004)

Panelist Reports, Custom Criteria:  New ability to save and load custom searches.  (August 2004)

Graphics and Charts, New Button for Auto/Manual Scaling Y Axis.  (August 2004)

New Reports for “Most Recent Results With Data”, new screens, more options.  (June 2004)

New Reports for “Show Dependents” for Questionnaires, Experimental Designs, Experiment Plans, Panel Groups, and Test Definitions.   More enhancements herein (June 2004)

Panelist Comparison Reports,  speed, Excel exporting, enhancements.  (June 2004)

Questionnaire Editing, , Multiple Attribute Copy and Paste.  (May 2004)

Raw Data Exporting, new columns for questionnaire comment questions. (May 2004).

Raw Data Exporting to statistical software, Excel, SAS, CAMO Unscrambler, SPSS (May 2004).

Most Technician Editing Screens:  Automatic Recall of ‘Last Code Touched”. (April 2004)

Test start parameters new option “Remove Sample Number and Count from Navigation Bar. (April 2004)

Test start parameters new option “Remove Sample Number and Count from Navigation Bar. (April 2004)

Test start parameters, general ease of use enhancements, better recall, hide unnecessary options.(April 2004)

Profile Testing new option “One Click Popups”, automatic question popup when grid clicked. (April 2004)

Profile Testing new ability to include demographic questions seen only once. (April 2004)

New IMMEDIATE INDIVIDUAL PANELIST FEEDBACK:    A new software tool for your Panelist Training.

The Immediate Individual Panelist Feedback Report enables panelists to see how their numeric responses compare to other panelists completing the same sensory test.   (March 2004)   This was a BIG enhancement to SIMS2000.

                                                                    Click here to see :  SIMS 2000 Immediate Panelist Feedback

Added tolerance and auto recovery for occasional network “Communication link failure” error.  (March 2004)

New Report:  Top 10 Most Recent Results With Data.  (February 2004)

Avery Labels, more options, more labels, better alignments, easier. (February 2004)

Questionnaire Editing, general ease of use improvements.  (Dec 2003)

Questionnaire Editing, new menu item: Go to Questionnaire Browsing,  along with ability to then Go directly to selected attribute.    (Dec 2003)

Questionnaire Editing, initial load and entry, will now panel clicks on TOP attribute so menu items appear right away as expected.   (Dec 2003)

Questionnaire Testing, streamline presentation, Affective Tests which are really Discrimination, all Attributes seen with Relative Sample Order 1.  (Dec 2003)

Questionnaire Design:  Discrimination Paired Comparison Non Forced Choice, add ability to use selectable Label for 3rd 'Neither' option.

Questionnaire Design:  Hedonics, Global Replace of Hedonic Labels throughout a Questionnaire

Questionnaire Design:  Questionnaire Horizontal Hedonics Attribute support (November 2002).

Questionnaire Design:  Speed up, and improve performance for long questionnaires.

Questionnaire Design:  Speed up, and improve performance of the questionnaire master selection grid.

Questionnaire Design:  Enhancements to the scroll bar usability for all questionnaires.

Questionnaire Design:  Line Scales, Reference Point Fonts, usability improvements.

Questionnaire Design:  Line Scales, various Color selections, and usability improvements.

Questionnaire Design:  Enhance/Fix: Hedonic Captions, very long captions, causing Word Wrap on multiple lines, fixed.   Also added more Wizard options, and now the Wizard Return Values are High to Low.

Questionnaires Design:  Editing, Hedonics, general human factor improvements.

Questionnaires:  White Space instead of Gray under Attributes (Sept 2003).

Questionnaires:  Fix Tabled Hedonics, may show in Editing as Tabled when not opted (Sept 2003).

Questionnaires:  Discrimination, add some white spaces under the options buttons (Sept 2003).

Questionnaires:  Discrimination Test Types, new bigger default font size for Triangle Attributes (Sept 2003).

Questionnaires:  Discrimination Test Types, remove some attribute sequence restrictions,  i.e. Instructions and comments same page as Disc Questions (Sept 2003).

Questionnaire Summary Form, Added informative Column for "Attribute Seen With".  (Dec 2003)

Questionnaire Summary Form, Added Export Grid to Excel.  (Dec 2003)

Experimental Designs: Fix rare instance of system error occurring when editing certain blinding codes.

Experimental Designs: Numerous usability improvements on 2^nd tab for Editing samples and blinding codes.

Experimental Plans, New ability to Import and Export Blocks Sample Order details directly from Excel .

Rotation Plans, Enhancement:  Allow User Default for View/Print Rotation Plans, for when using pre-defined Panel Group, allow user selection view/print Order by Sample Sets, Panelist Name alphabetic, or Both.

Polling screen, Enhancement:  New display option:  New Sample Wait Time.

Polling screen, Enhancement:  Samples displayed, increase Max from 12 to 15.

SIMS2000, Automatic PC Shutdown, enhanced to support for Windows 2000/XP.

Panelist Workstations - Substantial speed performances for wireless/slow networks.

Test Definitions - Auto populate the Description if NEW record, and Code exists in Experimental Design.

Test Results - Auto populate the Descriptions if NEW record, and Code exists in Test Definition.

 

Panelist Maintenance

New PANELIST CREDITS TRACKING:

Panelist Credits Tracking is used in SIMS2000 to Track Credits/Rewards for  Panelist Test Activity.  Credit Tracking has been designed to allow you to maintain a fully functional TRANSACTIONS-based series of Transactions.   Panelist Rewards!   This was a BIG enhancement to SIMS2000.

                                                                    Click here to see :  SIMS2000 Panelist Credit Tracking

New Panelist Notes History functionality:

Panelist Notes History is used in SIMS2000 Panelist Maintenance, to allow an unlimited number of Notes for any panelist, for any purpose.   Any text may be used to define Panelist Notes History.   Example use:  Track Panelist non-SIMS2000 Test historical information.  Reporting on Panelist Notes is available via Panelist Master Reports. The use Panelist Notes History in SIMS2000 is not mandatory.

 

Reports and Statistical Analysis

The New CrossTabs / Sub-Group Analysis Reports in SIMS 2000 explore data relationships between response observations and a selected criteria question. The Analysis Table Report generates a SAS analysis of data for a single selected sample and each possible value of the selected criteria question. From the SAS analysis SIMS2000 generates a Data Table comparing response observation means and p-values for panelists grouped by each criteria question response value.

                                 Click here to see :  SIMS 2000 CrossTabs / Sub-Group Analysis Reports

New Top 2 Box & Bottom 2 Box Advanced Analysis Reports in SIMS 2000 summarizes the extreme observations for Hedonic Attributes. Market research studies often refer to positive and negative rating measures using the Top 2 and Bottom 2 percentages as indicators of consumer acceptance.  Uses advanced SAS statistical Analysis.  Uses Table Generator, MS Word.  This was a BIG enhancement to SIMS 2000.

                                 Click here to see :  SIMS 2000 Top 2 Box & Bottom 2 Box Advanced Analysis Reports

New Raw Data Exporting to statistical software The CAMO Unscrambler, in addition to existing exporting to Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Word, SAS,  and Text Files.  Optional quotation delimiters.

                                                                    Click here to see :  SIMS 2000 CAMO Unscrambler DataLink

Raw Data Exporting, Add option for Date/Time of earliest Panelist data entry, on each row.

Raw Data Exporting, Add option for Excel Export to Include Panelist Custom Criteria data (Sept 2003)

CAMO Unscrambler Export, more Row Name options, such as Sample Description & Number.

Additional SAS Analysis Option - One-Way ANOVA Between Sample Groups  (May 2003).

Additional SIMS 2000 Report (Excel Format) - Preference Counts for Paired Comparison  (May 2003).

New SAS Log Warning detection message within SIMS2000 for Mean Separation procedures Warning, probably one sample test

Table Generator, add functionality to Sort by Attribute Name.

Table Generator, Now Allow Table generation from Test Results Codes (in addition to existing SAS and stored tables) .

Table Generator, Tukey’s, issue when any Panelist did not complete all Samples, SAS Listing would not have Means in GLM Section as expected. Fixed.

Table Generator, New Graphics Button, automatically launch SIMS 2000 Graphics using Table on screen.

Test Data Frequency Reports:  Added "Export Table & Graphics" to main screen (new Tab), to select from a Tests Attributes, send Frequency Table to Export (to MS Word) and launch into SIMS 2000 Graphics.  (Major Enhancement.)

Paired Comparison data results, and reports, are now shown as data 1=Sample1, 2=Sample2   (Dec 2003)

Frequency Test Data Reports, better labeling on certain Test Data Frequency Reports to reflect the Attribute's status as being Seen only with certain "Relative" or "Absolute" samples to avoid future confusion.

Continuous Time Intensity Report Form, Added: Export Grid to Excel  (Dec 2003)

Attribute Report:  Complete rewrite, more options, more speed, usability improvements.

New Discrimination Correct/Incorrect Report.

Discrimination Panelists Report Cards:  Complete rewrite, more options, more speed, usability improvements.

Panelist Activity/Performance Reports, Speed, Excel Exports  (Sept 2003).

 

 

Graphics and Charts

Enhance/Fix:  Make the Attribute Order be that of the Questionnaire's true Presentation Order (this was only an issue for questionnaires where a lot of editing and movement of attributes had occurred)

 

Administration / Other

Added Proxy Server Support, Check For SIMS 2000 Updates.  (Dec 2003)

Better use of Colors, Buttons, etc. throughout SIMS2000.

Editing Raw Data:  Complete rewrite, more options, more speed, usability improvements.

Speed improvements throughout system. Speed improvements may be dramatic in some areas, especially those client sites with lots of data.

International Support for Date formats dd/mm/yyyy.

Technician Users - Email Notification

Email Notification is an advanced SIMS2000 functionality to Automatically have an EMAIL message sent whenever a SIMS 2000 Technician User makes any MODS/ADDS/DELETES on either the Questionnaire Master Screen or the Experimental Design Master Screen.

Hidden Key Strokes for Technician Usage:
New Hidden keystroke, CTRL-E, will abruptly END TEST  (please use sparingly)

New Hidden keystroke, CTRL-U, will show list of unanswered questions on current page.

Skip Samples, allow decrement Reps to previous Reps, even if data in later Reps, allow decrement Samples to previous Samples, even if data in later Samples.

Security Enhancement:  Include user’s computer name and OS Login ID for some audit logs and messages.

Microsoft file MSVBVM60.DLL Version checking during program start, bad version=6.00.8877.  Tell User/Panelist if bad version detected.  Also show version in Help Information.

Enhanced Administrator report View Database/Server Options.  Tells more about Server hardware and configuration.

Administration, option to Bypass (site-wide) check for SIMS2000 Setup central location server share  (Dec 2003)

Additional Note:  Many of the newest enhancements are “behind-the-scenes”, relating to our  fine-tuning of the database speed and efficiency.

 

 

 

Version 3.3                                                  (thru Build Date August 2^nd, 2001)

 

Panelist Maintenance

Panelist Custom Criteria, significant update, various program areas.

Panelist Self Administration: Panelists can now Add themselves to the SIMS2000 System.

Panelists can now add and update their own custom criteria.

Panelist Screens look and feel similar to normal testing screens.

New Windows Icon for SIMS2000 Panelist Self Administration.

New dropdown menu item on SIMS2000 main menus: "Edit / Panelist Self Administration"

Microsoft Excel Exporting functionality for panelist criteria data.

 

New Fields in Panelist Master Maintenance:

Panelist Master Last Modification Date for Basic Information.

Panelist Master Last Modification Date for Custom Criteria.

Panelist Master Last Sensory Test Login Date.

Panelist Master Last Self Administration Login Date.

 

Test Design and Execution

Fix Backspace key press issue where a Next Page would occur unexpectedly.

Multimedia Image Attributes: Types: *.BMP, *.JPG, *.GIF. Other types may also work.

Multimedia Video Attributes: Types: *.AVI, *.MPG. Other types may also work.

Multimedia Sound Attributes: Types: *.WAV. Other types may also work.

New Hidden keystroke, CTRL-E, will abruptly END TEST (please use sparingly)

AnyRoom Panelist Login, Test Room selection screen: bigger fonts, better spacing.

Experimental Plans, Rotation Plans, dramatic speed improvement for complex randomization. (new Latin Square)

General enhancements and fixes to Panelist Sign in Screen. Bigger fonts, easier for Panelists.

Better support for ‘alphanumeric’ blinding codes under experimental designs.

General enhancements and fixes to Line Scales in Profiling Tests.

Test Status Screen/Grid, general enhancements and optional export to Microsoft Excel.

Experimental Plans, Added Complete Block Balanced Randomization, can be used instead of randomization at Test Definition.

Questionnaire Editing, new GoTo option for quick easy technician navigation.

 

Reports and Stats

Speed enhancements to all Reports.

Raw Data Exporting to Microsoft Excel and/or Text Files. Optional quotation delimiters.

Added program logic for hiding ‘Hidden’ Result Codes.

New report: ‘Quick All Results Code Summary Report’ on most Result Code Lookup screens.

Enhancements and Fixes to Ranking Frequency Reporting. Also better labeling, more options.

Panelist Master Reports, better criteria subset selection.

Selection SAS Files and/or post analysis data, during Table Generation, improved user interface.

SAS, more warnings are displayed to SIMS2000 technician, if reported by SAS in execution logs.

Enhancements and Fixes to Comment Reporting. Also better labeling, more options.

Avery Labels. Added Discrimination Triangle Tests use of Test Definitions, eliminates extra label(s).

Enhancements and Fixes to Time Continuous Reporting. Also better labeling, more options. Sample Averages.

Microsoft Word and Table Generation, many new options for Exporting.

New Report: Project Status Report. Shows all projects (Test Result Codes), various options, MS Word Export.

Active Room Status Report, new option to Export to Microsoft Excel, many new options.

Speed improvements for generation and display of Lookup Tables (combo boxes) for Test Result selection. Speed improvements may be dramatic, especially those client sites with lots of data. This Test Result selection occurs on many SIMS2000 screens, such as Reports, Stats, Execution, etc.

Graphics and Charts

New functionality, creation of graphs and charts directly from SIMS2000 Test Results Codes. This is in addition to the existing functionality which only used data after it was processed thru SAS Analysis. Therefore, graphs and charts are now available for all SIMS2000 tests, using standard linear means, without the need for any advanced SAS statistics.

 

Administration / Other

Resetting Panelists, allow Forced Reset to individual panelists even if test is running.

New Technician Hidden Keystroke, CTRL-E, will allow ending a panelist test in progress on the panelists station.

New easier use of Windows File Folder Browse, when appropriate, such as User options, SAS locations, etc.

Better support in SIMS2000 for Windows 2000 default active desktop color schemes set via Control Panel / Display / Appearance, especially gray.

Added/Fixed Multimedia AVI Movie support for Windows 2000, IE 5.5, and Windows Media Player 7.

SQL Server 2000 Platform Database Support. (a.k.a. SQL Version 8.x)

Ability to Check for SIMS2000 Updates via the web, via SIMSFTP.

All ‘Save As’ screens now support Windows Long File Names.

New Check for SIMS2000 Updates, direct download of newest SIMS2000 release from Internet.

Better support for International Date formatting.

New version of SIMS2000 Demonstration / Tutorial. New version of distribution CDROM Front End.

>>> End of List <<<

 

Version 3.2                                                (last release January 2001)

 

Administration / Other

SIMS 2000 User List: Add new field for last login date. Can be seen on Edit Users and Display Users.

Deleting Panelists Form: Various improvements with general ease of use. Deleting Panelists from Tests: Fix issues where Panelist’s slot would remain unavailable to other panelists. (This issue was a common for our clients, a big improvement here.)

User Data Path: Allow short path names.

User Data Path: Disallow use of spaces, full long path names are not supported.

User Message Forms: Various improvements.

Backup: Allow backup of ONE questionnaire. Will be handy for clients to email us their questionnaire for assist in support or problem resolution. Backup function continues to allow full SQL DB backups.

 

Additional Note: Many of the newest enhancements are "behind-the-scenes", relating to our fine-tuning of the database speed and efficiency.

 

Test Design and Execution

Panelist Sign in: Now allow instant Resetting of panelists at Panelist station when they receive message stating that they are "Already signed into an active room". (Technician-only trick)

Panelist Sign in: Improvements to avoid message that "The Number of allowed Panelists has been exceeded", SIMS 2000 will now do a more advanced search for an open panelist slot.

Panelist Sign in, Lookup: Allow key press auto lookup and selection on last name.

Panelist Sign in, Lookup: Now only include "Active" and eligible Panelists in Lookup Grid.

 

Test Design and Execution

Test Execution: New option to "Force Panelists to Enter Sample Code", instead of the normal message they receive stating what their next sample code will be, which is optional.

Test Execution: Fix rare instance of Questionnaire Line Scales with "No Knob" not properly allowing navigation to Next Page or Next Sample.

Test Execution: Fix rare instance of END Button not appearing on older Windows PCs.

We also added additional Technician-only trick keystrokes if issue remains.

Test Execution: Fix rare instances of issues with Reference Points.

Test Linking Forms: Various improvements with general ease of use.

Polling Screen: Fix rare instance of disappearing sample set information.

Polling Screen: Fix rare instance of errors when resetting panelists while viewing all rooms.

MAPID Table: (Technical description) Fix various issues, now global verification, and auto resync if necessary, that panelists counts in result tables will properly match those with MAPID records. Tests with entire panelist population.

 

Test Analysis and Reports

SAS Analysis: Add Support new SAS Release 8.x.

SAS Analysis: Add Support for Long File Names pointing to SAS.EXE.

SAS Analysis: Remove limitation of 140 character length of batch processing, ’submit’.

SAS Analysis: New "Other Analysis Option" for "Incorporate Panelist Consistency Over Reps",

change SAS Model statement Order resulting in use of P-Values from the Samples, not the Reps

SAS Analysis: New ability to create Calculated Attributes, which are derived Delta attributes from existing real and presented attributes from your questionnaires.

SAS Analysis: New analysis, Dunnett’s T Test, to derive source of mean scores, like Duncan’s.

Used for Multiple Comparison Analysis of a Difference from Control test.

Reports: New Top/Bottom 2 Boxes Report. Summarizes the extreme observations for hedonic attributes (Hedonic attributes only). The report also includes the superscripts, p-values, and significance levels as reported in normal analysis for each of the hedonic attributes.

Reports: New Data Sub Grouping Report, also referred to as Sub-Group Analysis or CrossTab Analysis, is used to analyze the data based on responses to a particular question or questions.

Reports: New Panelist Comparison Report - Attribute Columns by Sample - Excel Export Only.

     The report also displays means for each attribute type except comments.

Reports: Improved Data Frequency Report, for more question types.

Reports: Improved Discrimination Paired Comparison Report. Now prints better information on which result is Sample 1 & Sample 2

 

 

Version 3.1                                               (last release October 2000)

 

Administration / Other

SIMS 2000 is now a 100% 32-bit native Windows application.

Elimination of ODBC 16-bit requirements.

Faster use of native 32-bit controls and Windows DLLs.

 

Setup: Microsoft Internet Explorer, Version 5.0 or newer required.

Setup: Microsoft ODBC32 MDAC, Version 2.5 (2.50.4403) or newer required.

Setup: Added Advanced option to Install Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Setup: Uninstall Support via Windows Control Panel

Setup: Added Advanced option to Install Microsoft ODBC32 MDAC.

 

Setup: Added Advanced option to Install Microsoft DCOM (W95 only).

Setup: Added Advanced option to Install Microsoft Windows Media Player.

Email Support: Email interface build in SIMS2000 to easily communicate with SCS.

Error Reporting: Added ability to easily Email to SCS error screen reports.

FTP Support (File Transfer Protocol). General usage, Backup SQL File FTP to SCS Feature.

Reorganize / simplify Administrative options screens.

Temporary files automatic maintenance.

Year visual formats expanded to yyyy. SIMS2000 was already Y2K in previous versions 2.9 & 2.8

Rewrote Shutdown Utility.

Rewrote Print Screen Utility.

Isolated bugs fixed.

 

Test Design and Execution

Questionnaire Design: Added Sample Profiling.

Questionnaire Design: Ability to ‘Hide’ older and unneeded Questionnaires.

Questionnaire Design: Increased size of lookup table/grid, header click to toggle alpha sort order.

Experimental Designs: Ability to ‘Hide’ older and unneeded Experimental Designs.

Experimental Designs: Increased size of lookup table/grid, header click to toggle alpha sort order.

Panelist Groups: Ability to ‘Hide’ older and unneeded Panelist Groups

Panelist Groups: Increased size of lookup table/grid, header click to toggle alpha sort order.

Test Definitions: Ability to ‘Hide’ older and unneeded Test Definitions.

Test Definitions: Increased size of lookup table/grid, header click to toggle alpha sort order.

Test Results: Ability to ‘Hide’ older and unneeded Test Results.

Test Results: Increased size of lookup table/grid, header click to toggle alpha sort order.

Text Execution: Added option to disable the sign-in screen "Lookup" button.

 

Test Analysis and Reports

Panelists Master Report, Added Panelist Location to Select Criteria:

Panelists Master Report, Added additional output fields for location and new phone related fields.

Frequency Reports: For Hedonic Question types, include ‘wording’ that was used for choices.

Frequency Reports: For Y/N Question types, include value descriptors Y=2 N=1.

Data Results Reports: For Hedonic Question types, include ‘wording’ that was used for choices.

Data Results Reports: For Y/N Question types, include value descriptors Y=2 N=1.

Avery Labels: Added "Save and Remember" custom printer alignment tweaking.

Graphics: Ability to save Graphics and Charts in various file formats, Windows Bitmap .BMP, JPEG Bitmap .JPG, or Windows Metafile .WMF.

Graphics: Overall functional enhancements.

 

Panelist Master Data

Added new data field: Location, to specify general location of panelist, i.e., for multi test-site clients.

     Added new data field: Work phone extension.

     Added new data field: Home phone extension.

     Added new data field: Cell phone number.

     Added new data field: Beeper phone number.

 

Database

Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 / 6.5 Support.

Full RDO usage (Remote Data Objects) for SQL database, drop older DAO.

Added ability to use DSN-Less ODBC 32-bit connections.

Additional user screens for troubleshooting SQL database connectivity issues.

Additional Backup and Restore Functionality.

FTP Support (File Transfer Protocol). General usage, Backup SQL File FTP to SCS Feature.

 

 

Version 2.9                                               (last release August 1999)

 

Test Design and Execution

Questionnaire Design: Long Questionnaires, (more then 80 attributes) enhancements and performance improvements. Questionnaire Design: Fixes to issues with reference points.

Questionnaire Design: Additional Magnitude Question Design options.

Questionnaire Design: Various cosmetic fixes.

Experimental Designs: Streamlined blinding codes logic for improved ease of use.

Now shows all blinding codes for all samples, and all reps.

Experimental Designs: New optional Description user sees in message box at beginning of each sample in additional to the sample number and blinding code..

Experimental Designs: Fix for the occasional "record not found" error.

Panelist Groups: Streamlined panelist selection logic for improved ease of use.

Panelist Groups: Added ability to easily view available active panelists by Gender.

Enhanced features for Copy & Paste during questionnaire/experimental design.

Master Screen Grids now sort ascending and descending by clicking on grid headers.

Optional Test presentation feature to bypass the sample number verification.

Optional Test presentation feature to show previous sample values in a popup window.

Test Execution: Additional Speed when saving between panelists screens, especially for slower wireless handheld PC panelists stations.

Test Execution: Fixed issues with Comment questions with certain experimental plans.

 

Test Analysis and Reports

New options for Panelist Master Listing:

Order by Random sort, in addition to by Name and by Panelist ID Number.

Include groupings of Email addresses, with any email system delimiter.

Analysis: Optional Number of Decimal places for Means on SIMS 2000 Generated Tables.

Analysis: Added option to have SIMS 2000 create a native SAS SD2 data file.

Can be used by a Statistician in SAS for additional data manipulations.

Reports: New "Most" Panelist Activity Reports. List your panelists who have participated in the most tests, and who have answered the most questions.

Reports: Panelist Comparison Reports, increased max samples per page to 10, from 8.

Reports: Panelist Comparison Reports, increased speed performance with big tests

Reports: Discrimination Comment Reports, enhancements/fixes.

Reports: More Avery Label options for printing blinding codes.

MS Word Linking, improvements and fixes with Final Tables.

Added two types of Magnitude Estimation Analysis: Arithmetic and Geometric Analysis.

Added more final Table information for Discrimination Beta Analysis.

Added additional information in SAS Contrast Analysis.

SAS: Better detection and messages for SAS License expiration.

 

Administration / Other

Notes Buttons: More notes buttons added throughout system to assist with current screen options and more explanations.

Polling Screen: Increased maximum to 80 panelist stations on polling screen simultaneously.

There is still no logical limit to the number of actual testing stations.

Polling Screen: Discrimination Triangle Test display update fix.

Ability to disable the panelists ID Lookup screen during test sign-in, site-wide option.

Enhancement for Editing SIMS 2000 User Lists, i.e. Sensory Technicians.

Setup: New Version of Client Application SETUP.EXE (Wise 6.0)

Setup: Added option to select number of Affective Room # Icons that will be placed into the SIMS 2000 Desktop Folder, default is for 2 Affective Room Icons, may also now select 5 or 10.

Setup: By default, no longer writing to registry, can be optionally set to do registry.

CD ROM Auto Run - Additional options and information.

PCA 8.0 added to CD ROM.

Microsoft Service Packs 3 and 4 for Windows NT 4.0 added to CD ROM.

Microsoft Service Packs 3 and 4 for SQL Server 6.5 added to CD ROM.

 

 

Version 2.8                                               (last release October 1998)

 

Notes: Version 2.8 was a maintenance release of SIMS 2000. Many of the newest enhancements are "behind-the-scenes", relating to our fine-tuning of the database speed and efficiency.

 

 

Database Size

The amount of disk space used by the SIMS 2000 SQL Database during all normal operations has been reduced significantly. This was accomplished by our enhancing how the test results are saves. Test results are the most abundant type of data saved in the database. After the SIMS 2000 version 2.8 update, your database size requirements will reduce by at least 50%.

 

Test Analysis and Reports

Panelist Good Discriminator reports are now available.

Panelist Report Card reports are now available.

Discrimination Positional Analysis Reports.

Enhanced features for data set combinations.

SAS enterprise additional parameters available.

 

Test Design and Execution

Enhanced features for Copy & Paste during questionnaire design.

Enhanced features for editing Blinding code experimental design.

Optional Test presentation feature to bypass the sample number verification.

Page Complete/Incomplete for panelist’s reference.

 

Administration / Other

Additional system information screens available.

Auto Run added to the SIMS 2000 CD.

Wireless networking throughput performance enhanced.

 

 

Version 2.7                                               (last release February 1998)

 

Test Design and Execution

Test Linking. Panelist signs in once and automatically participates in multiple SIMS 2000 tests without having to re-sign in again.

Skip Patterns / Logical Branching added to questionnaire designs. This feature allows the technician to specify which questions are presented to panelist based on previous question responses. Branching gives you the ability to jump/skip over pages based upon the panelist’s answers to designated attributes. For example, you might force a panelist to answer a series of detailed questions about liking only if his/her overall liking was over (or under) a specified level.

Line Scale viewable return values now allow customized font types, font colors, and font sizes.

Line Scale anchors now allow customized font types, font colors, and font sizes.

Line Scale reference points now allow customized font types, font colors, and font sizes.

Line Scale tic marks now allow customized font types, font colors, and font sizes.

Magnitude Estimation question types, normalization of data analysis.

Comment question types can now be presented to require/not require a panelist response according to your choice.

Comment question types can now be presented with or without visual keyboard on screen.

Speed improvement for Inserting and Deleting questions in a large questionnaire.

New Tab in Experimental Designs - Test Request information. Study objective, Client name, Client phone number, Analyst name, Product available date, Results required by date, Yes/No check box indicating if the design can be used for testing.

Experimental Designs - Optional Automatic incrementing of Design codes based upon a calendar year format yyyy-####, such as 1998-0001.

Experimental Designs - Number of Respondents can now be specified as Zero. This value will be checked during Test Definition and reverse populated using the number of panelists on the panel group selected during testing.

 

Creating Test Definitions

A new option which will only display (for selection) questionnaires not previously used.

A new option which will only display experimental designs not previously used.

A new option which will only display experimental designs with Schedule = Yes.

Two additional fields to record Start and End dates of test.

Test Definitions - Random Rotation Balancing. SIMS 2000 can now allow a rotation plan to be "acceptably" balanced for sample position using your desired degree of "Rotation Tolerance" from perfect. Since some plans simply can not be perfectly balanced due to simple mathematics, you can now balance the rotation plan so that the Maximum difference between the most times any sample is presented in a given position and the least times any sample is presented in a given position is no greater than the value of n which you specify.

Test Definitions - "Days" Option. Allow you to setup your sample rotation, and test execution, organized by "Days", instead of by Reps.

Test Results Master - a new option which will only display (for selection) test definitions not previously used.

Test Results Master - a new option which will only display test definitions with experimental designs with Schedule = Yes.

Test Results Master - a new field for "Description User Sees" for this test, used by panelist workstations running the Panelist AnyRoom Icon. This is to prevent panelists from seeing any potentially biasing information about the study.

Test Results Master - Under Test Status, new option to View Panelist Detail, showing every panelist who has signed into the test with the number of attributes completed. This is a good way to identify panelists who did not complete the test for whatever reason.

Test Execution - New option to Bypass the Sample Set Verification Prompt to the panelists.

Test Execution - New option for a Resign in Delay, in minutes. When a panelist completes a test rep, or is forced out between samples, this delay will prevent him from re-entering the test until a specified number of minutes have passed, while making his panelist workstation available to other possible panelists.

Test Execution - New option to allow a test to present samples continuously over reps. This would make the test appear to the panelist as one rep, many samples.

Test Execution - Ability to bump/skip a number of samples on a panelists by panelist basis. This can be useful for those rare instances of a network failure. During a network outage, testing is continued using paper ballots. When the network is restored, the test administrator can increment the panelist serving order for each person to account for those evaluations that were administered using the paper ballots.

Test Polling Screen - New option to show "Day" info instead of "Rep" if "Day" info exists.

Test Polling Screen - New option to automatically clear display of completed stations.

 

Test Analysis and Reports

New option to specify significance levels during export and analysis. These significance levels will also appear on new table footers.

Table Generation modification to allow option to use the JUDGE | SAMPLE Interactions Model.

A new ANOVA parsing routine is utilized to parse the interaction probability value, instead of the sample probability value to the means table.

Speed of Panelist Comparison Report improved.

Panelist Activity Reports are now available, summarizing test involvement for each person selected.

Attribute Frequency Table Reports are now available.

Discrimination Comment Reports - more options.

Avery Label Printing - more options.

Simple Ad-hoc SQL Queries are now available.

More advanced Ad-hoc SQL Queries are now available via ISQL_W utility.

Graphics and Charts - even more options.

 

Administration / Other

Edit User Defaults now allow technicians to have SIMS 2000 remember their favorite:

     Experimental Design Paging Method

     Experimental Design Block Presentation

     Experimental Design Sample Presentation

     Test Definition Panel Type

Result Master Sample Set Selection

 

Edit User Defaults allows technicians to change their own SIMS 2000 passwords.

SIMS 2000 database verification expanded and speed improved.

SIMS 2000 Print Screen utility improved and fixed for rare Windows 95 issues.

SIMS 2000 technician quick database backup function. Will create a simple text file of your entire SIMS 2000 SQL database.

Ability to easily view SQL database status, setting and options, such as database size, database space available, memory allocated to SQL databases on the NT Server, etc.

Wireless LANs - Support and fine tuning for this growing requirement added.

The SAS System Version 6.12 is now included on the SIMS 2000 CD-ROM. Sensory Computer Systems has entered into an arrangement with SAS Institute, which allows us to distribute an evaluation copy of SAS.

 

 

Version 2.6                                               (last release December 1997)

 

Test Execution and Administration

New Panelist Workstation Icon "Panelist Any Room" which allows any panelist, for any test, to use any panelist test workstation station at any time. The panelist signs into SIMS2000 and will be presented with a list of tests to choose from for which he or she is eligible or scheduled to participate in.

Increased flexibility in scheduling Panelists to take tests with multiple replications.

Enhancement to Test Status Polling Screen to now also show which rep a panelist is taking.

Increased flexibility in viewing parameters of an executing test.

 

Test Analysis and Reports

Speed of Table Generation improved.

Graphics modules now offer greater flexibility in selecting and masking attributes, samples, and time intensity intervals.

New Attribute report: Provides means and frequency distributions for selected attributes across all samples. Especially suited for panelist demographic questions.

 

 

Version 2.5                                               (last release September 1997)

 

Test Designs

Continuous Time-Intensity, with capability to record observations with time intervals as small as .1 second.

Additional Questionnaire Wizards.

 

Test Execution and Administration

Hands-free Test Status Polling Screen automatically knows when new tests are started.

Status screen can now left running "forever" since it now automatically detects when a panel room test ends and when the next test begins.

Test Status Polling Screen now can display across all Tests based on Station Numbers.

Based on all Panelist Station Numbers instead of by logical panel rooms.

"Secret" Administrative Panelist ID allows exiting from SIMS 2000 Panelist Station to desktop.

The keyboard is no longer required, user settable ID, default is ID=9991234999 SIMS 2000 application now automatically ends when a computer system shutdown detected.

                                   

Test Analysis and Reports

Continuous Time-Intensity Analysis and Graphics:

     I_max, Area after I_max, Area before I_max, Area Under Curve,

     Rate of increase, Rate of decrease, T_init, T_onset, T_max, T_plateau, T_dur, T_ext, T_trun, etc.

     Time-Intensity Individual Panelist Graphs

     Time-Intensity Entire Panel Summary Graphs.

New and Improved Table Generator Options.

Reordering of Attributes and/or Samples.

Drop Attributes and/or Samples.

Export your Table directly to Microsoft Word!

All Textual reports can now be easily exported directly into Microsoft Word.

 

Panelist Criteria Reporting.

Select panelists from your custom criteria data fields and/or typical Panelist Information fields.

(such as gender, age, allergies, product usage, etc.).

Advanced SQL Script Syntax available.

Save your favorite criteria search SQL scripts (i.e. Data Warehouse automation).

 

Improved Editing of Raw Data.

New and Improved Graphics.

 

 

Version 2.4                                               (last release January 1996)

 

CD-ROM Installation and Update Distribution.

 

Test Designs

All Varieties of Discrimination Testing.

Automatic Telephone Response Data Collection.

Ranking Test Question Type.

Questionnaire Wizards.

 

Test Execution and Administration

User-Customizable Test Status Polling Screen

Avery Labels Blinding Code Printing

Panelist Sample Set Assignment Options

 

Test Analysis and Reports

Editing of Raw Data.

New and Improved Graphics.

Optional Tukey’s Studentized Range (HSD) Test.

Duncan’s Multiple Range Test.

Least Squares.

Multivariate Analysis – Short Form (Canonical Discriminant Analysis).

Multivariate Analysis – Long Form (Factor Analysis, Cluster Analysis, Stepwise Discriminant Analysis).

Friedman Analysis for Ranked Data.

"Nested Analysis" – Judge Nested within Blocks.

Test Data Frequency Reports.

Binomial Analysis for Discrimination Attributes.

One-Tailed Analysis.

Two-Tailed Analysis.

Beta Analysis.

Discrimination Comment Report.

 

 

>>> End of List <<<