Docs/Tutorials/02-Ganglion_Getting Started_Guide.md

Ganglion Getting Started Guide

Overview

This guide will walk you through setting up your Ganglion, connecting it to your computer, and then connecting it to yourself. The first tutorial is for Mac users, the second is for Windows users. Please review this guide in its entirety before starting. Have fun!

Note that the Ganglion is not set to be discoverable out of the box, you need the GUI or another app.

What You Need

1. OpenBCI Ganglion Board
2. 6V AA battery pack & (x4) AA batteries (batteries not included)
3. (x4) plastic feet for board stabilization
4. OpenBCI Gold Cup Electrodes, or your own electrodes, and Electrode Paste
5. Snap Electrode Cables and Snap Electrodes
6. A computer connected to the internet

1. Your Ganglion

The battery connector on the back can accept 3V to 12V DC power input. The pushbutton is a reset button. For more information on the Ganglion Hardware, visit the OpenBCI Ganglion page in the Hardware section.

2. Gold Cup Electrodes and Paste

If you ordered OpenBCI Gold Cup Electrodes and Electrode Paste, it should come with:

• 10 passive, gold cup electrodes on a color-coded ribbon cable
• 3 2oz Jars of Ten20 conductive electrode paste

If you plan to work with your own electrodes, the Touch-Proof Adapter will come in handy. It will convert any electrode that terminates in the industry-standard touch-proof design to an electrode that can be plugged into any OpenBCI Board!

4. (x4) Plastic Feet

Your OpenBCI kit comes with 4 plastic feet that can be snapped into the holes of your board to provide extra stability while working.

5. Your 6V AA Battery Pack & 4 AA Batteries

Install 4 AA batteries in your battery pack, plug in your Ganglion board and turn on the power switch. You should see the BLUE LED blink gently. Blinking means that the BLE radio is not connected or paired with any computer or phone/tablet. Once the Ganglion is connected, the LED stays steady on.

Download/Install/Run the OpenBCI GUI

Please follow the step by step guide to install the OpenBCI_GUI as a standalone application. Keep an eye out for specific Ganglion specific requirements, such as, on Windows, using Zadig to change the driver for your BLE CSR dongle.

Come back to this guide when your GUI is running!

Start Using The OpenBCI GUI

Connect the GUI to your Ganglion board

Make sure your computer's Bluetooth feature is turned on. Select LIVE (from Ganglion) from the first drop down

Select BLE (on Win from Dongle) as the transfer protocol

The GUI will automatically start searching for Ganglion devices. Each Ganglion has its own unique 4 character ID (in HEX), and you will see it listed in the BLE DEVICES window. If you don't see any Ganglions, check to make sure your Ganglion has a battery connected, is switched on, and the blue LED is blinking. If there are multiple Ganglions in the room, you can find yours by turning it off, clicking the REFRESH LIST button, then turn on your Ganglion again. Make a note of your Ganglion's 4 character ID.

Select the desired Ganglion device from the dropdown list

The GUI will automatically generate a recording to a file. You have an option at this point to create your own file name, in the DATA LOG FILE window, should you choose to.

Press START SYSTEM when you're ready to begin streaming.

Navigating the GUI

When the GUI connects, it opens up to the default window layout. For a more in-depth guide to the GUI interface and functionality, check out the OpenBCI GUI doc. For the purposes of this introductory tutorial, You should follow the following steps to setup the GUI.

Click on the Layout dropdown menu, and select the one outlined in red.

Click the Vert Scale dropdown menu, and change the Vertical Scale to Auto.

Click the Head Plot dropdown menu on the lower right widget container and change it from Head Plot to Accelerometer. Then turn on the Accelerometer by clicking the Turn Accel On button.

Then click "Start Data Stream" to stream data from your Ganglion board.

You should see the Time Series window scrolling some data to the left, the FFT Plot container will show you the power level of the signals at different frequencies. The Accelerometer window will also scroll data.

Pick up your board, and move it around. You should see the data in the Accelerometer window also move around, and if you're touching the input pin header, you will see some noise in the other windows. Nice!

NOTE If you're having trouble, check out the troubleshooting section below.

Now that you've got your computer connected to the Ganglion, it's time to connect your self! \

Connect yourself to OpenBCI

In this quick demo, we'll be showing you how to set up your Ganglion to read 3 your heart activity (ECG), muscle activity (EMG), and brain activity (EEG)!

For more information on these three signals, refer to wikipedia:

• Heart Acitivity - Electrocardiography (ECG)
• Muscle Acitivity - Electromyography (EMG)
• Brain Activity - Electroencephalography (EEG)

1. View ECG/EKG Signals

Let's start off with something simple, ECG is the electric signal that causes your ticker to tick, and it's easy to measure if you attach electrodes on either side of your body.

In this example, I'm attaching two of the sticky SKINTACT electrodes to either arm, and then an extra one on my elbow. It doesn't matter what elbow you choose.

Pin Switches

Make sure these switches are in the "up" position (which is the factory default):

Now a note about your Ganglion board setup. There are 4 switches on the top of the board that are used to re-route the input connections to make connecting yourself easy. The default setting (the way your ganglion was shipped to you) is with the switches in the UP position. This allows you to connect your electrodes to the + and - pins of any channel, and measure the differential between them. For more of a deep dive on Ganglion Hardware, go to this hardware overview document.

Connect Electrodes to Ganglion Board

Connect the female header ends (the square, plastic ends) of three electrode wires to your Ganglion board, as shown below:

Here's the color scheme we're using for this tutorial:

Electrode wire color	OpenBCI Ganglion Board
Grey	D_G (bottom pin)
Purple	3+ (top 3 pin)
White	3- (bottom 3 pin)

The purple and white wires can also be attached to 1+ (top 1 pin) and 1- (bottom 1 pin), or 2+ and 2-, or 4+ and 4-.

Connect Electrodes to your Arm

Attach SkinTact sticky electrodes to all three of the electrode ends. Stick the purple electrode (the 3+ pin) on your left arm, and the white electrode (the 3- pin) on your right arm.

NOTE Connect the + pin to your LEFT arm, otherwise the pulse wave will be upside down! The + pin is on the TOP row of the pin header. See the Ganglion Hardware doc for more details.

Stick the grey electrode (the D_G bottom pin) on your elbow. This is the Driven Ground pin of the Ganglion, and it is important to connect to this pin so that you and the Ganglion 'agree' on what 0 Volts is, otherwise your signal will be unstable.

View ECG/EKG Signals in the GUI

Since we are only using channel 3 for this example, you can turn off the other channels so that they don't fill the screen with noise. Click on the channel number to turn off channels 1, 2, 4. You can also turn them back on just by clicking the number.

You should see on the Time Series window a waveform that is called a 'normal sinus rhythm'. That's your heart beat! If you don't see a waveform like the one on the right, then you might be a robot... One way to check to make sure that you are wired up to the Ganglion correctly is to do what's called an Impedance Check. This process will measure the connection quality between your body and the Ganglion.

To measure your connection to the board, we have to change the Accelerometer widget into the Impedance widget. Click on the Accelerometer drop down menu and select Ganglion Signal. You will see a button labeled Start Impedance Check. Press that button.

When you start the impedance check, the data will stop streaming, but some numbers will start to pop up in the Ganglion Signal window. These values are a measure of the input impedance, or the connection quality, between your body and the Ganglion. In the case of using ECG electrodes on bare skin, you would expect to see a value of between 5k and 10k. Notice the other channels are reporting high values. That's because there is nothing connected to them! Notice that the dot next to Channel[3] Impedance is green. That means it's good! The lower, the greener, the better!

2. View EMG Signals

Now, let's take a look at some EMG signals. EMG is the measure of the electrical activity of your muscles, and to do this, we will need to attach another of the SKINTACT electrodes. I'm sticking another one on my RIGHT wrist, and attaching the snap cable to it.

The EMG signal is a high frequency signal that is really easy to see in the Time Series window. In this image, I'm squeezing my fist three times in a row.

3. View EEG Signals

Now we'll take a look at EEG some signals, or brainwaves!

Adjust Input Switches

Switch all of the input switches to the DOWN position, as shown below:

Remember, when we ship your Ganglion the switches SW1, SW1, SW3, SW4 in the UP position, which allows you to connect to each channels + and - input pins. In this configuration, we say that these are "differential inputs". When the switch is in the DOWN position, the - pin is disconnected from the electronics, and that - input is connected instead to the REF pin. In this way, the switch helps you to gang together two or more of the - pins to use as a single reference. This scheme is useful when doing EEG, as you will soon see.

Connect Electrodes to Ganglion Board

Connect the female header end of 6 Gold Cup electrodes to the pins at the top of the Ganglion board, as shown below:

The electrode wires should be connected like this:

Electrode wire color	OpenBCI Ganglion Board
Grey	1+ (top 1 pin)
Purple	2+ (top 3 pin)
Blue	3+ (top 3 pin)
Green	4+ (top 4 pin)
Yellow	REF (top or bottom is OK)
Black	D_G (top or bottom is OK)

In this case, you want to be sure to connect to the + input, of channels 1, 2, 3, and 4, which is on the TOP row. You also need to connect one cable to the REF pin (either TOP or BOTTOM is ok) and also the D_G pin (either TOP or BOTTOM is ok).

Connect Ground and Reference Electrodes

Scoop up a small amount of the electrode paste with the gold cup of the 'D_G' electrode (the black electrode). Then stick the electrode on your ear, as shown below. It can help to use some medical tape or a bandaid to help hold the electrode in place.

This D_G electrode connection allows the Ganglion to 'share' GROUND or 0 Volts with your body, so that we can measure the electo-potentials correctly. The electrode paste is an adhesive, as well as an electrical conductor - it makes an electrical connection between your skin and the gold cup. We are attaching the D_G electrode to your earlobe because there is very little electrical signal in your earlobe, so it won't interfere with what's going on in your head.

Do the same thing with the gold cup of the 'REF' electrode (the yellow electrode), and attach it to your other earlobe. The REF pin is connected to all of the channel - inputs. When we attach the rest of the electrodes to your head, their signals will be measured against this 'REF' electrode.

Connect Channel Electrodes

It's important to know where you are placing your EEG electrodes on your head, and thankfully there already is a map of electrode positions. It's called the 10-20 system, shown below:

The Nasion is the 'nose' side of your head, and the Inion is the 'back' side of your head. I have color-coded the electrode positions for you, based on the cables connected in previous image, and you can see that we've already applied the D_G and REF at positions A2 and A1 respectively.

The positions Fp1 and Fp2 are your Frontal Parietal positions. They should be placed semetrically on your forehead as shown in the picture. Fp1 should connect to Channel 1, and Fp2 should connect to Channel 2. I'm using the same color electrode wires as is used in the GUI channel color.

Channel 3 and Channel 4 should be connected to your head in the O1 and O2 positions. These are going to measure your Occipital lobe (Connected to your eyes!). make sure to part the hair, and get the electrode connected right on to your scalp. It can help to have a friend do this part with you. VERY important to make the connection to your scalp! use more electrode paste if you need to.

I'm using a headband to help hold the electrodes in place, and now I'm good-to-go! Let's check out some EEG!

Start the GUI as you have done before, and this time, set the Vert Scale to 50uV.

Press the Start System button, and give the data a moment to settle. The first fun thing to measrue is eye blinks. If you blink your eyes, you will see a signature wave in the EEG signal on Channel 1 and Channel 2.

Next, let the signal settle again and then grit your teeth just a bit. You should be able to see some nice EMG from your jaw muscles in two or more of the channels.

Finally, let's try to get some brainwaves! The easiest brainwave to make 'on command' is an alpha wave. In most of our waking life, our eyes are open and the occipital lobe of our brains is busy processing all of the visual information streaming onto our retinas. It just so happens that when you close your eyes, your occipital lobe has 'nothing to do' as it were, and goes into an 'idle' state. In this state, it produces a brainwave at about 10Hz (between 8Hz and 12Hz). You can measure the alpha wave with the Ganglion when your eyes are closed. So now, close your eyes, and have your friend watch the GUI for signs of alpha. You should see a dominant waveform in the Time Series window, and a rising peak in the FFT Plot at about 10Hz. Well, you won't see it, because you have your eyes closed! But your friend who helped you put the electrodes on will see it!

If you having any trouble seeing the signals above, one thing that might be an issue is the connection between the gold cup electrodes and your scalp. You can test this connection by doing an Impedance Check. Click the button Start Impedance Check and you will see values start to come up at each electrode. The small circle on the left will change color according to the impedance, with green being good and red being not-good. Using gold cup electrodes and paste, you should be seeing impedance values in the range of 5k to 15k. If they are higher, you will need to adjust the connection, add more paste and re-position the electrode if necessary.

Happy Brain Hacking!

RUN THE GUI ON macOS SIERRA

When Apple Computer updated their Operating System to Sierra (v10.12.x), they changed a few things about your Security & Privacy default settings. Sierra won't allow any apps that aren't from the App Store or Identified Developers. While we work on becoming Identified Developers, you will need to change your default Security & Privacy settings. Here's how to do it:

1. Open the Terminal app from your /Applications/Utilities/ folder and then enter the following command syntax: sudo spctl --master-disable and press the return key.
2. You will be prompted to enter your administrator password. Do that, and then press return key.

This hack was published by osXdaily September, 2016.

Now, go to your System Preferences/Security & Privacy and make sure that your system allows apps downloaded from Anywhere. You may again be prompted for your administrator password.
Now go back to where you were before to continue!

##TROUBLESHOOTING

If the initialization and data stream fails, try the following steps:

1. Make sure your computer's Bluetooth is turned ON
2. Making sure you've selected the correct Ganglion, if there are multiple Ganglions in the viscinity.
3. Power down your Ganglion, and close the GUI. Then try restarting the system, buy turning on the Ganglion, and restaring the GUI.
4. Make sure that your batteries are fully charged and then retry the steps above.
5. If you are still having troubles connecting to your OpenBCI board, refer to the Forum for extra troubleshooting advice.