New features

Written By Bill Fulton

(AI-generated image) No animals were harmed in the making …

 

Quite a lot has happened in Behayve over the last year or so! Here’s a list of new features, up to V4.4. For details, check out the latest User Guide.

Many of the enhancements were suggested by users, and we’re most grateful. Please keep the suggestions coming!

NOTE: In the coming months, there will be a pause in new features while we are busy performing a migration of Behayve code to a more modern technology platform. This is required to ensure Behayve’s long-term future. You will not see any change in the resulting new release, V5.0, except that it may run a little faster.

New features

  • Exports can now be to email. This applies to all exports: observations, configuration items and the database.

  • Imports can now be from the web. This applies to all imports: database, studies, merge, configuration items and sample media for behaviors and species. Web links can be from your website or personal cloud drives: iCloud, Dropbox, Google Drive or OneDrive. (Sharepoint-based links are not supported.)

  • Roles may now be assigned to subjects from another group, allowing inter-group interactions. This applies to communal mode as well.

  • In Merge, you can now specify a range of sessions to be merged, or all sessions.

  • The Import study function has been repurposed to import individual studies. The configuration of the study is imported and the sessions are suppressed. Import of subjects can optionally be suppressed.

  • Sample images, videos and sound clips of species may be reviewed during sampling to aid selection. A gallery facility is also provided. The media files are included in database export/import operations, and media may be deleted when compacting the database.

  • Behaviors and species may be configured to be offered during sampling for only a single specified group and its subjects

  • The sample Elephant study now includes example images for behaviors and example sound clips for species

  • Communal roles, for rapidly evolving social dynamics

  • A new Observations>Roles export that lines up roles in their own columns and also displays communal role details

  • In behavior exports, modifiers and data items are now lined up in their own columns

  • In behavior exports that include behavior fixes, KMZ and JSON exports are generated, supplementing the spreadsheet exports

  • Ability to filter subjects by user-defined criteria, using a Selector

  • PerScan data items, prompted each time a scan is recorded

  • A scan interval can now be fractional minutes

  • In Review Edit, subject notes may now be reassigned to a different subject, and group notes likewise may be reassigned to a different group

  • In Review, the maximum number of lines per observation has been increased from 50 to 100

  • Configuration option to define color of individual subject buttons in sampling

  • Ability to hide behavior classes, behaviors, species, groups, subjects, roles, modifiers, data items, choices, places and areas; can be used in conjunction with study clone to remove traces of trial runs

  • Separate spreadsheet columns added for events and states

  • When cloning a study, an option is given to drop all subjects

  • For indoor locations, small enclosures and other situations where GPS may be unsuitable, Behayve additionally provides 2D or 3D positions relative to the observer, as (east, north, height) coordinates

  • PerEndSampling, a new kind of Data Item, has been added. This allows Data Items to be prompted for when the End button is tapped during sampling - these are applied to the most recently referenced subject or group. PerEndSampling can be useful when in-progress state behaviors must be terminated simultaneously with the End button, before there is time to enter subject or group data.

  • Behaviors can now be configured so that, during sampling, behavior buttons are color-coded

  • Speed Recording is now selectable on either a per-behavior basis or globally for all behaviors

  • Exports for Focal, Behavior or Ad Lib sampling now show state durations even where the user did not explicitly terminate state behaviors. The finish time for such behaviors is taken to be when the End button was pressed to terminate sampling. An annotation shows which state behaviors were automatically terminated.

  • In Group configuration, an exact copy of a group and all of its subjects can be created, with a single click.

Bill Fulton
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End of beta for Android