ANY-maze Help > The ANY-maze reference > The Protocol page > The elements of a protocol > Inputs and outputs > On/off outputs > Setting up an on/off output > Specifying whether the physical port used by an on/off output is always the same

Specifying whether the physical port used by an on/off output is always the same

The option described in this topic is only shown when a protocol includes at least one movable zone.

In brief

In the majority of situations, the physical port used by an on/off output will always be the same - it's simply the port on the interface device to which the device being switched actually connects.

However, you may encounter situations in which the port depends on the location of a movable zone. For example, in a Y-maze, you may have a lamp (connected to a switch) mounted at the end of each arm of the maze. Now you want to create an element called 'Goal arm light' (let's imagine that the light comes on if the animal spends a certain amount of time in this arm), but you have set the 'Goal arm' to be a movable zone - i.e. it isn't always the same physical arm of the maze, but changes between tests. Thus the 'Goal arm light' will be the lamp in whichever arm happens to be the goal arm in a particular test, which necessarily means it won't always be the same physical lamp (and therefore, the 'Goal arm light' won't always be connected to the same physical port).

Details

If you do have an on/off output whose physical port depends on the location of a movable zone, like in the Y-maze example above, then you simply need to specify this by selecting the appropriate option from the drop-down list in the switch element's page of the protocol.

When you do this, the element will automatically be given one 'Port to use' sub-element for each location of the movable zone you chose - so in the Y-maze example, there will be three 'Port to use' sub-elements, one for each arm of the maze. You'll then be able to use these sub-elements to specify which port is used for each of the possible locations of the zone.

ANY-maze help topic T0195