This tutorial demonstrates how to set up a time limit for a section of your task and how to add a visible time countdown. As opposed to the Screen Timelimit and Countdown tutorial, which shows how to set up the time limit and display a countdown for a single screen, this tutorial shows how to set these for a selected section of the task which can include several screens and displays. It is useful when you want to limit the time participants have to complete different sections of your task. Section Time Limit also allows you to set a response value generated upon time expiry which can be used to determine what should happen when the time limit expires - you could, for example, branch participants to different screens, or end the task for them. The Section countdown can be displayed on multiple screens, keeping your participants informed on how much time they have left to complete each section of the task.
We set up the Section timelimit in the Screen tab by adding a Section Time Limit component. On the screen where we want to start the countdown, we select the Start Mode and specify the time limit for the whole section. We add Check Mode to all the screens which are included in the timed section - this way Gorilla checks if the specified time limit has expired. If it hasn't expired, the task and countdown continue, but if it has, the task will cut off and a response specified in the Check mode will be generated - in this tutorial it is 'jump' and we combine it with the Jump To Row component to direct participant to the Debrief screen (spreadsheet row 17) when they run out of time. Add a Section Time Limit component with a Stop mode to the screen where you wish the time to stop counting towards the section time limit. You can time multiple sections of the task by adding Start and Stop modes - in this tutorial we separate time Practice section (5s) and Test section (10s).
To display the countdown, we add a new, empty Object in the Object tab and add a Section Countdown component to it. In the Section Countdown component we indicate the time we wish to display using the countdown in the Show Partial Time Remaining field (note that it can also be equal to the total timelimit if you want to show participants the entire time they have before that screen progresses).
Both Section Time Limit and Countdown times can be either fixed to specific numbers or bound to another source of data, e.g. a spreadsheet column with various times for each section. You can find more information about binding to the spreadsheet in our Binding Guide.
